LIBRARY OF CONGRESS. 

©(jap ©*pi?ris¥ 3fa 



UNITED STATES OF AMERICA. 



SHADOWS. 



% 7 



BY 



GEORGE K. CAMP. 

li 



DEC 2 1385^ I 



San Francisco : 

A. L. BANCROFT & COMPANY. 

i88 S . 






Entered according to Act of Congress in the year 1885, by 

George K. Camp, 
In the office of the Librarian of Congress, at Washington. 



CONTENTS. 



FIXED SHADOWS. 
rondeaux : page 

The Reason Why ....... ii 

In the Snow-flakes ...... 12 

She Smiles on Me .... .13 

'Tis All for Thee ...... 14 

I do not Care ........ 15 

'Tis but a Tear . . . . . . 16 

Ah Me !......... 17 

Look Up ........ 18 

Forever True ........ 19 

When I was Young ...... 20 

Just Sweet Sixteen ....... 21 

It was a Dream ....... 22 

Rondels : 

Scatter the Shadows ...... 23 

Mignonette ....... 24 

Which Shall it be? . . . . . . .25 

Nothing ........ 26 

Villanelles : 

Which were the Better? ...... 27 

Sweet, Sad Love ....... 29 

The Lament of the Rejected . . . .31 



CONTENTS. 



Triolets : 

Wooing is Bad . 

Only a Rosebud 

Shadows 

Blue Eyes 

In the May Weather 

Sonnets : 

Youth's Dream 
Lee . 

Ballades : 

Ballade of Deceitful Woman 
Ballade of Country Places 
Ballade of the Cold Sea 
Ballade of the Golden West 



page 
33 
34 

35 
36 
37 

38 
39 

40 
42 
44 
46 



SHIFTING SHADOWS. 



Thaumaturgus 

Unfinished 

Waiting 

To Ida 

The Cottonwood Scourge 

An Empty Necropoli 

To Mrs. Hattie Stewart 

The Iconoclast 

Laquelle ? 

The Phantom Barque 

Toll the Bell 

Fate 

Reveries . 1 

My Boy 

Miserere 



51 


54 


57 


59 


62 


. 65 


68 


70 


82 


• 83 


85 


88 


90 


92 


94 



CONTENTS. 



The Heart . 

To Atlanta 

The Dove and the Maiden 

The Fever 

The Blossom and the Breeze 

Baby's Prayer 

Legend of the Kissimmee 

Pawning the Petticoat 

Oregon Sue . 

Dead Man's Bar 

The Growl of the Gold-digger 

Song of the Klamath 

"Tranquilla" 



page 

96 
98 

IOt 

102 
106 
no 

112 
Il8 

126 

133 
I38 

145 
I50 



SHADOWS OF DAWN. 



To Dell 

To a False Charmer 

Fancies in the Fire 

My Sweetheart 

Her Name 

Nemesis 

Song of Life 

Still will I Happy be 

The Fatal Pledge 

Belle 

Heaven's Roses 

Farewell 

Whose is She? . 

A Sigh on the Air 

Faithless 



i55 
iS7 
159 
163 

165 
167 
171 
173 
175 
180 
181 
184 
187 
190 
192 



FIXED SHADOWS. 



THE REASON WHY. 

THE reason why, I cannot tell, 
Yet bird, and breeze, and brook, and shell,. 
The same sweet song sing night and day, 
And love is woven in the lay, 
Like perfume in a blossom's bell. 

I feel my heart expand and swell 
With sweets from out some fairy dell, 
But naught confides, seek as I may 
The reason why. 

There is a maid whose eyes — ah, well ! 

They light her red lips' hydromel, 
As star beams over roses stray — 
Perhaps — though mind ! I do not say — 

Perhaps this gentle maid might tell 

The reason why. 



IN THE SNOW-FLAKES. 

IN the snow-flakes — in the wheeling 
Coronation stands she, stealing 
Sly and saucy looks at me, 
Looks whose half I only see 
'Neath her white lids' swift revealing. 

Still I catch a deeper feeling 
(Which the lashes fail concealing), 
Goldening futurity, 

In the snow-flakes. 

So I put aside appealing 

To her love in this congealing 

Atmosphere, and ask if we 

Must forever parted be ? 
And there is a love's annealing 

In the snow-flakes. 



SHE SMILES ON ME. 

SHE smiles on me, but in her downcast eyes 
1 That look a lullaby of silent sighs 
The silken, soft, and drooping lashes under, 
A pirate lurks, the heart's sweet freight to plunder, 
And then to cast adrift the ravished prize. 

Still, like a cloud, sun-kissed to dazzling dyes, 
And by the glory blotted from the skies, 

I revel in her rays; — yet who can wonder ! 
She smiles on me. 

I know the swift and deadly lightning lies 
Behind the snowy curtains' deep disguise; 

I know the shackled and imprisoned thunder, 
Will rend its mute environments asunder, 
But love above all overthrow shall rise — 
She smiles on me. 

13 



'TIS ALL FOR THEE. 

) r ¥ ^IS all for thee — the wild unrest, 

The dream-bird's song in slumber's nest, 
The rapture glowing through disguise 
When in my clasp thy soft palm lies, 
And love stands silently confessed. 

My heart has but one welcome guest, 
With one fond feeling is oppressed, 

For when it sings and when it sighs, 
'Tis all for thee. 

When like a low wind from the west 
That breathes the prayer it knoweth best, 

Impassioned melodies arise 

From love's sweet lute — when longing eyes 
Droop with a melting, mute request, 

'Tis all for thee. 

14 



I DO NOT CARE. 

I DO not care — thy chosen path pursue , 
These are some foolish whisperings to rue, 
Some idle hopes and tokens to recall, 
But that is all — 
And thorns may thicken where the lilies grew. 

And yet what shafts of passion melted through 
Thine eyes' wild witchery and wondrous blue ! 
Still, if cold gloom must on their glory fall, 
I do not care. 

Nay, sweet one, whisper softly thou art true, 
And with these dimpled hands in mine, renew 

Love's tender thrall; 
Pluck not the roses from life's barren wall, 
Nor thus with ashes strew — ah well ! adieu ; 

I do not care. 

15 



'TIS BUT A TEAR. 

J r ¥ "^IS but a tear, still in its mute embrace 
1 A weeping sorrow veils her weary face : 

It is a hope, a prayer, a wild regret, 
A cenotaph for starry dreamings set, 

A wandering drop from passion's broken vase. 

It is a mantle shielding frail disgrace, 
An alkahest for noble and for base 

When grief or disappointment comes — and yet 
'Tis but a tear. 

It is a gem which lights the dimpled face 
When rapture rides the heart his frantic race; 
A scimeter in azure eyes, or jet, 
Whose argument no man hath ever met; 
A sword whose bright edge leaves nor scar nor trace — 
'Tis but a tear. 

16 



AH ME! 

AH me! ah me ! — whence comes the low refrain? 

J~\^ I heard it erstwhile — hark ! Ah me ! — again. 
I feel the tingling blood in pity sweep 
Along my veins ; and still the tidings creep 

Upon the darkness like a funeral strain. 

There is the muffled death-roll of the rain 
Upon the icy rampart of the pane, 

But through it drifts a diapason deep — 
Ah me ! Ah me ! 

Is love unfaithful that the hours complain ? 

Doth some gray phantom haunt the night amain ? 
It is the voice of griefs that may not sleep, 
The dirge of days who for their errors weep, 

For love is vanity, devotion vain — 

Ah me ! Ah me ! 

(2) I 7 



E 



LOOK UP. 

OOK up, my pet — look to the open sky, 
Turn like a violet thy slumbrous eye 
Unto the clustered stars, and thou shalt see 
The measure of the love I bear for thee — 
Nay, do not sigh; 

If men have faithless been in days gone by, 
Still to my pleadings grant a sweet reply; 

Shed all the gracious light of love on me — 
Look up, my pet. 

There is no fate my soul would not defy 
That on this breast thy gentle head might lie, 
For in my life thy presence still must be 

Its mystery 
Eternally — and wilt thou still deny? 

Look up, my pet. 

18 



FOREVER TRUE. 

FOREVER true, my heart must cleave and cling 
Unto its cross of love and suffering : 
It still must bloom, its weary life renew 
With tears for dew, 
And sighs for breezes blown from sorrow's wing. 

What solace may the fragrant breath of spring 
Unto a dead or painted lily bring ! 

Or to a heart that dreams its lone life through, 
Forever true ! 

What care I that the birds of summer sing, 
And blossom-bells their chimes of perfume ring ! 
I only know that eyes so fond to woo, 

So deeply blue, 
Are shrouded, and my heart is — broken thing — 

Forever true. 

19 



WHEN I WAS YOUNG. 

WHEN I was young, and sweet hopes hung 
Like blooms the dewy hours among, 
A wandering minstrel softly stole 
Into a corner of my soul, 
And nestling there, divinely sung. 

Weird strains of music from his tongue 
Were sweetly breathed or wildly flung, 
And love was life's enchanted goal 

When I was young. 

But now the harp to which I clung 
Is mute, dismantled, and unstrung ; 

The minstrel's songs no longer roll 

From out my bosom's frozen pole, 
And all the hopes are dead that sprung 

When I was young. 



J 



JUST SWEET SIXTEEN. 

UST sweet sixteen, with hair of sunshine rolled 
In many a flossy flake and flame of gold, 
And cheeks through which enchanted roses press 
A dim suspicion of the tenderness 

Their bloom enfold. 



She loved, alas ! a youth as poor and bold 
As any youth who loved in days of old ; 
Ah ! she was fondly foolish, I confess, 

Just sweet sixteen. 

Then came a suitor with a wealth untold, 
Who craved her tender charms to have and hold, 
And he was sixty — rather more than less — 
Still, with a sigh, the maiden murmured "yes/ 
Knowest thou the maiden soul and body sold — 

Just sweet sixteen? 



IT WAS A DREAM. 

IT was a dream, but from the golden day 
It turns full many a sunny shaft away, 
And solemnly its spectral presence swings 
On dusky, dim, and omnipresent wings, 
Above my life, like some grim bird of prey. 

What boots it that I petulantly say, 
When gloried over with the noon's red ray, 
And human fellowship its valor brings, 
" It was a dream \" 

I saw the tawny moon-tide sweep and sway 
Athwart a maiden's charming cheek of May, 
And when I sighed unutterable things 
And wooed her in the glad stars 7 glitterings, 
The odor of her lips' sweet rose was Nay! — 

It was a dream. 



SCATTER THE SHADOWS. 

THOUGH time with drastic silent surge 
Sweeps graveward all the human race ; 
The darkest wave it may up-urge 
Is lighted by some smiling face. 

Philosophy or faith will chase 
The shadows from life's outer verge, 
Though time with drastic silent surge 

Sweeps graveward all the human race. 

Then let us from dim doubt emerge 

Into the light of love's sweet grace, 

And let the dolor of the dirge 

Unto a joyous song give place, 

Though time with drastic silent surge 

Sweeps graveward all the human race. 

23 



MIGNONETTE. 

HAZEL-EYED maiden, Mignonette, 
Harken the tale I would o'er-tell, 
The lesson my heart hath learned so well 
From love's alluring alphabet. 

Never can I the smile forget 

Which over my life in splendor fell — 
Hazel-eyed maiden, Mignonette, 

Harken the tale I would o'er-tell. 

Songs of the sea must ever fret 

The pearly throat of the haunted shell, 
But love's are the only sweets that swell 

From the lips of my perfumed "dainty pet," 

Hazel-eyed maiden, Mignonette. 



WHICH SHALL IT BE? 

" T T ^HICH shall it be," the maiden sighed, 

V V "The heart of love, or the hand of gold ? 
The gaunt wolf roams in the wintry wold, 

And the sea of years moans wild and wide !" 

Ah ! poverty plays on the harp of pride, 

And the world is dark and the world is cold — 

"Which shall it be/' the maiden sighed, 

"The heart of love, or the hand of gold?" 

The wave of want is a bitter tide, 

Whose saddest wrecks are still untold, 
For grief wraps silence, fold on fold, 

O'er the story death shall wholly hide — 

"Which shall it be," the maiden sighed, 

"The heart of love, or the hand of gold?" 



NOTHING. 

" T T J HAT are your thoughts, my pretty maid?" 

V V " O nothing/' she replied, 
The while her cheeks in red arrayed 

The soft response denied; 

For there are tricks in every trade, 

But love hath naught to hide ; 
"What are your thoughts, my pretty maid?" 

"O nothing/' she replied. 

A footstep wandered down the glade, 

A footstep as of pride, 
And all her soul with sweets was swayed 

When he stood at her side: 
" What are your thoughts, my pretty maid ? " 

"O nothing/'' she replied. 
26 



WHICH WERE THE BETTER ? 

THE heart may break, the heart may bend. 
Bend or break with a tear or sigh — 
Which were the better in the end ? 

Droop with a love in silence penned, 
Sink with the sorrow of good-by : 
The heart may break, the heart may bend. 

Wearily over the world to wend, 

Or under a marble slab to lie — 
Which were the better in the end ? 

Cold the clasp of a treasured friend, 

And wintry shadows haunt her eye ; 
The heart may break, the heart may bend. 



FIXED SHADOWS. 

Doubts and fears my bosom rend ; 
To sue sweet favor or to fly — 
Which were the better in the end? 

I plead unto the stars, who send 
But mocking echo in reply : 
"The heart may break, the heart may bend- 
Which were the better in the end?" 



28 



SWEET, SAD LOVE. 

" / nr~" v HE sweet sad love that mortals know"- 

1 So sighs the pine, so sobs the fir — 
"Is but a jewel set in woe; 

"It is the soul of winds that blow 

Around the crumbling sepulcher, 
The sweet, sad love that mortals know; 

"And e'en the fond heart's overflow, 

And tearful wish for days that were, 
Is but a jewel set in woe. 

"A maiden sings our boughs below 

And wooes, her dreamy eyes aver, 
The sad, sweet love that mortals know ; 

29 



FIXED SHADOWS. 

" She cannot deem in hope's rich glow 

That passion, newly born to her, 
Is but a jewel set in woe. 

" And thus, forever, sad and slow 

Our muffled strings to sorrow stir : 
The sad, sweet love that mortals know 
Is but a jewel set in woe." 



3c 



THE LAMENT OF THE REJECTED. 

IF she must be another's blushing bride, 
Perhaps 'tis best : 
The world which once was gracious still is wide. 

Yet gloomily a grief will ever hide 

Within my breast, 
If she must be another's blushing bride ; 

While hope, foregoing all for which she sighed, 

Shall banish rest ; 
The world which once was gracious still is wide. 

And but a wreck my soul will rock, and ride 

On sorrow's crest, 
If she must be another's blushing bride. 

31 



FIXED SHADOWS. 

Ah me ! that love should find at eventide 

No waiting nest ! 
The world which once was gracious still is wide. 

Then let regret put on the plume of pride 

And make new quest, 
If she must be another's blushing bride ! 
The world which once was gracious still is wide. 



WOOING IS BAD. 

WHICH is the best to woo, 
Tell me, I pray, 
Brown eyes, or black, or blue — 
Which is the best to woo ? 
"Which will dead love renew, 

Hazel or gray ? 
Which is the best to woo ? 

Tell me, I pray. 

Wooing is bad at best, 

Sweet though it be ; 
Nay, fairest, smooth thy crest, 
Wooing is bad at best ; 
Love's is a brittle nest 

In a glass tree ; 
Wooing is bad at best, 

Sweet though it be. 

(3) 33 



ONLY A ROSEBUD. 

ONLY a rosebud red, 
As a heart token, 
Scentless now, sere and dead, 
Only a rosebud red, 
Like to the hope it sped, 

Blighted and broken ; 
Only a rosebud red, 

As a heart token. 



34 



SHADOWS. 

THE sun sinks, and shadows mute and gray 
Like ghosts upstart! 
And mutinous memory holds despotic sway 
When the sun sinks, and shadows mute and gray 
Steal from the trailing drapery of day 

Into my heart. 
Ah ! the sun sinks, and shadows mute and gray 

Like ghosts upstart. 



BLUE EYES. 

BLUE eyes, whose curtains fall 
Over their glory ! 
What heart cannot recall 
Blue eyes whose curtains fall 

On love's sweet story ! 
Shielding, yet showing all, 
Blue eyes, whose curtains fall 

Over their glory. 



36 



IN THE MAY WEATHER. 

UNDER dim twilight skies 
In the May weather, 
Soft pleas and sweet replies, 
Under dim twilight skies, 
Waken to lips and eyes 

Wedded together, 
Under dim twilight skies 

In the May weather. 



YOUTH'S DREAM. 

O HEAVENLY dream!" a fair youth sighed, 
As 'mongst the buds and blooms that twine 
Their beauties in love's red sunshine 
A vision nestled, gracious-eyed, 
Out-wafting witchcraft far and wide 

From look and parted lips divine — 
" O dream, no future shall divide," 

Said he, " thy loving heart and mine ! " 

But when the youth about his prize, 

Enraptured, eager arms had thrown, 

The wild light faded from his eyes, 

The rapture from his heart was flown ; 

For reft of passion's sweet disguise, 

The burden that he bore was stone. 



38 



LEE. 

OUT from the battle's wreck of pride and plume, 
And all the midnight of mad overthrow, 
The chieftain strode, as heroes must who grow 
The grander for an atmosphere of gloom : 
Came with a soul unrifled of the bloom 

Which faith and courage marry to bestow ; 
Came back to love which was a crown to woe, 
A garland for his sorrow and his tomb. 

And when his rigid icy hands were crossed 
Above the big brave heart forever hushed, 

So warm a heart became so cold a stone ! 
The people pondered but on what he lost 

When from his brow the drooping bay was brushed, 
And in his greater grief forgot their own. 



39 



BALLADE OF DECEITFUL WOMAN. 

IT happened in the balmy spring, 
When perfumes fresh and rare 
Dripped from the brooding twilight's wing 
Upon the drowsy air ; 
And she, Kathleen, was young and fair 
As dreams of fancy's weaving, 

And I thought not, in passion's glare, 
That woman is deceiving. 

My little one, I said, I bring 

Sweet hope to speed my prayer, 

The while her cheeks were blossoming 
With love-buds waving there : 
O she was fond and debonair 

Beyond cold art's achieving, 

And in my heart there was no care 

That woman is deceiving. 



FIXED SHADOWS. 

Sweetest, I said, this golden ring 

On thy white finger wear ; 
See how my lightest kisses cling 

Like rose-leaves to thy hair ! 

Come to my soul, I said, and share 
Life's gladness and its grieving, 

Unthoughful in love's charming snare 
That woman is deceiving. 

Envoy. 
Ah, prince ! we are a happy pair, 

Too happy for believing; 
And in my rapture I forswear 

That woman is deceiving. 



BALLADE OF COUNTRY PLACES. 

HEARKEN the sad recital of my woes 
That will not brook concealment in my breast, 
For even now the dermis of my nose 

Is peeling off and powdering my vest ; 
Perhaps when my misfortunes are confessed 
This wild disgust may lose its sharpest traces ; 
But heed my warning — be no summer guest 
At country places. 

Said I, last August, How the hot sun glows ! 

The very air is with the glare oppressed. 
O for the fields, I said, where piping crows 

Build in the daffodils their stately nest. 

Wherefore I left the city, traveling west, 
And plunged into the greenwood's airs and graces, 

My bosom full of dreams of grateful rest 
In country places. 



FIXED SHADOWS. 

Alas ! alas ! no milk nor honey flows, 

Nor fresh eggs tarry where I made my quest ; 
The bony farmer said, " Sich projuce goes 

For them rich city fellers to digest/' 

Meanwhile, the sun made up his mind to test 
The staying quality of human faces, 

And my poor nose put on a crimson crest, 
In country places. 

Envoy. 

Ah, prince ! a thousand insects, bad at best, 

Along my back ran mad and frantic races ; 
And things that move live only to molest 

In country places. 



BALLADE OF THE COLD SEA. 

THE breeze was balmy and the sea was blue, 
And morning into blossoms kissed the spray, 
When gallantly a blithe and merry crew 
Into the frozen ocean sailed away. 
Ah ! little recked they of the piercing day 
When phantom icy fingers would bestow 

The last sad rite and wrap the rigid clay 
In cerement and sepulcher of snow. 

Familiar home-scenes faded out of view, 

And winter smote the faded cheeks of May, 
But onward still the bark, to duty true, 

Into the frozen ocean sailed away. 

The wild wind shrieked, the sky hung leaden gray, 
The clouds shook out their fatal dust below, 

And in the shrouds a hoarse fate seemed to say, 
"In cerement and sepulcher of snow.' 



FIXED SHADOWS. 

His black, bleak mantle cruel midnight threw 

Athwart the sinking sun's last rosy ray, 
And clasped in chill embrace the brave men who 

Into the frozen ocean sailed away. 

No day-beam on the gloom made bold to stray, 
And Hope herself forsook the haunt of woe : 

Ah me ! " God pity them/' we can but pray, 
" In cerement and sepulcher of snow." 

Envoy. 

A gallant crew, with banners streaming gay, 
Into the frozen ocean sailed away ; 
But now they rest— ah well ! — the angels know, 
In cerement and sepulcher of snow. 



BALLADE OF THE GOLDEN WEST. 

GOOD-BY, my darling/' the young man cries; 
"Good-by till I build thee the dearest nest 
In the land of soft Hesperian skies. 

In the golden solitudes of the west." 
The maid to her true-love's heart is pressed, 
And into her eye the quick tear leaps ; 

But when he is gone o'er the hill's dim crest 
She foldeth her empty arms, and weeps. 

Full many a blithesome token hies 

To gladden the maiden's eager breast, 
And whisper of love's unbroken ties 

In the golden solitudes of the west. 

But when on her warm and rosy rest 
The cold pale oaf of absence sweeps, 

And doubt is her heart's unbidden guest, 
She foldeth her empty arms, and weeps. 

46 » 



FIXED SHADOWS. 

The years drift by like lingering sighs, 

Like deep-drawn sighs from an age's chest, 
For the maiden's heart, like a crushed rose, lies 

In the golden solitudes of the west; 

And hope flies forth on a fruitless quest, 
For mystery over the dead hush sleeps, 

And the maiden forgets " God knoweth best/' 
She foldeth her empty arms, and weeps. 

Envoy. 

The maiden may find no alkahest 
In the golden solitudes of the west, 
But over a mound, where ivy creeps, 
She foldeth her empty arms, and weeps. 



SHIFTING SHADOWS. 



(4) 



THAUMATURGUS. 
I. 

WHAT is the reason of the snow 
Fluttering flower-like down below, 
Out of a mystic realm opaque 
Where no star-beam brightens a break ? 
What is the reason of its fall 
White and clean from an ashen pall? 
Why not quiver, and whirl, and float, 
Out of a cloud cup's crystal throat ? 
Why not fairily slide and slip 
Over the winter's glittering lip, 
Rather than meek, and soft, and dumb, 
Out of the womb of gloom to come ? 

II. 

Why should the vanquished ice-god fling 
Magical wafts from his bitter wing, 

si 



SHIFTING SHADOWS. 

Quickening earth to fragrant deeds 
And wooing the wastes to bourgeoning 

Where the luminous line of snow recedes? 
Why should he challenge the sun to bring 

A glory wherever his footstep leads ? 
Yet ever the daintiest buds emerge 
From the folds of the fading winter's surge, 
And birds their tenderest anthems sing 
In the hush that follows the dead year's dirge, 

And heralds the dimpled spring. 

III. 

What is the impulse glad and wise, 
Who is the angel in disguise, 

Scattering wreaths of sweetest flowers 

Over the ashes of the hours ? 
What is the force that underlies 
All our wonderful love implies ? 
Love, that like a violet grows 
Out of the couchings of the snows, 
Love that bends like the lily, prayer, 
Over the dim rim of despair ; 
Who is the spirit of the spell ? 
Harken, and let thine own heart tell. 



SHIFTING SHADOWS. 

IV. 

Love is the secret, love the power, 

Changing the snow-flake to the flower, 

Purging the mad heart's bitter well 

Into a heavenly hydromel ; 

Love on the earth, or love above, 

Still wherever, 'tis only love. 

Love it is that strews the snow 

Out of a leaden waste of sky, 
Only to teach that brooding woe, 

Breaks into blossoms by and by, 
Only that we may better know 

The rest which waiteth on a sigh. 



UNFINISHED. 



I. 



FROM out the years obscure, remote, 
Unfinished song on shadowy wings 
Across my life forever float, 

And brush from love's abandoned strings 
Their saddest note. 

II. 

I catch the sweet familiar strain 

Which first through life's fair temple swept, 
But silence grasps it back again, 

And nothing fills my soul, except 
A weary pain. 



SHIFTING SHADOWS. 



III. 

The night winds, as they murmur by, 
Bring e'er some isolated link, 

Some fragment from the wrecks that lie 
Within the past, then sadly sink 
Into a sigh. 



IV. 

How oft my fond heart makes pursuit, 

When, through the dark boughs of the firs, 

A faint voice like a spirit flute 

The starry hush of midnight stirs, 

Then all is mute. 



V. 

How often, when the moonbeams play 
With shadows in the wilderness, 

I fancy in some graceful ray, 

The flutter of a phantom dress, 

Long passed away ! 



SHIFTING SHADOWS. 

VI. 

Thus through the dim rifts of the years, 
But broken chords of memory rise, 

And fancy, deeming that she hears 
The olden songs, uplift her eyes 

Through heavy tears. 



VII. 

And life must, like a statue, stand 

Half wrought in fate's grim studio, 

An outline of a poem planned 

By hope which perished 'neath a blow 
Of sorrow's hand. 



56 



WAITING. 
I. 

WHERE booms the blue Atlantic on its beaches 
In bright, revolving reaches, 
And, like a sighing nun, 
The oak in mossy veiling, dusk and dun, 
Her musical sweet creed forever teaches 

Beside the singing sea, 
I sought for hope and love, and found despair and thee # 

II. 

The cedars hung their deep-hued banners o'er us, 

The billows broke before us, 

And tenderly at rest 
Thy golden head lay pillowed on my breast, 
Until so bitter fate asunder tore us, 

And bade the years sweep by 
On wings that waft my soul a song that is a sigh. 



SHIFTING SHADOWS. 



III. 



I gave thee back no sweet and tender token, 

Love's links are all unbroken, 

Its plighted troth is true ; 
And, though disparted, fondly I renew 
The sacred compact in the star-shine spoken, 

And bide the golden hour 
When in my life shall bloom love's first and fairest flower. 



5* 



TO IDA. 
I. 

GENTLE maiden, maiden pure, 
Maiden dove-eyed and demure, 
From the soul's most golden censer 

Graven to thy portraiture, 
Waft I tenderness intenser 

Than I mutely may endure. 

II. 

When the night's soft hands unbar 

Dreamy hours crepuscular; 
When the wing of twilight hovers 

In the silence faint and far, 
Love but only thee discovers, 

Smiling on me as a star. 

59 



SHIFTING SHADOWS. 

III. 

When the warm winds in the pine 

Sing a lullaby divine, 
Or in low sonatas tremble 

Where the wreathing roses twine, 
Still their sweetest tones resemble 

But the melody of thine. 

IV. 

In the lily, in the dew, 

In the violet's dear hue, 
I can read but love's fond tidings 

Breathing all their beauty through, 
And the midnight's hushed confidings 

E'er thy wooing voice renew. 

V. 

In thy bright and gracious eyes 

Elfin love in ambush lies, 
And his arrow, swift and certain, 

With a sudden rapture flies 
Through the fringes of the curtain 

Drooping o'er the fond disguise; 



SHIFTING SHADOWS. 

VI. 

And the ruthless, roving lance 

From the quiver of thy glance, 
With a pang a sigh discloses, 

Wounds the bosom it enchants, 
And my heart, in chains of roses 

At thy feet, a captive, pants. 



61 



THE COTTONWOOD SCOURGE. 



i. 

BY the banks of the turgid Klamath, 
In the shadow of snowy peaks, 
A pestilence swings on implacable wings, 
And horribly seeks, through the wearisome weeks, 
Fresh food for its hungerings. 



II. 

In the pine, in the fir, in the cedar, 

In the multiple tongues of the night, 
There is ever a moan near akin to a groan, 
And silence itself has a sorrow its own 

For the souls that have sailed out of sight. 
62 



SHIFTING SHADOWS. 



III. 



The plash of the rain on the window, 

The feathery flight of the snow, 
The moonbeams that drift through the luminous rift 
Of the cloud-rack — all tenderly, tearfully lift 

Their voices in threnodes of woe. 



IV. 

I stand in the city of silence, 

In the acre of broken hearts, 
And deem that I hear in the fall of a tear 
The music that thrills on an angel's ear 
When the golden life cord parts. 



And the dusky plumes of the pine-trees 

With a sad, soft anthem sigh — 
A melody sung by no human tongue, 
From the harp of death by a cold hand flung 
To those who yet must die. 

63 



SHIFTING SHADOWS. 

VI. 

And the past and present and future 

Are blent in a single tone — 
An isolate note from a ghostly throat, 
That over a new mound seems to float, 
And whiten into a stone. 

VII. 

By the banks of the turgid Klamath, 

Where the snow-browed peaks upshoot, 

A sad-eyed care upon the air, 

Like the soul of a deep, unspoken prayer, 
Broods eloquent and mute. 



6 4 



AN EMPTY NECROPOLIS. 

I. 

GRIEF etches on the marble-lidded tombs, 
With tears for tools, an epitaph of woe; 
He works in silence where the willow-plumes 
Rain sighs and shadows on the hush below, 
While through the trailing surge of cypress glooms 
The stars, like great death-diamonds, sadly glow, 
And hope and patient love — poor human things — 
Above the icy ashes fold their wings. 

II. 

Like muffled chords from some grand organ flying 
A fugue of souls through time's cathedral sweeps, 

Among the arches of the dim years dying — 
The arches where immortal echo weeps — 

(5) 65 



SHIFTING SHADOWS. 

And constantly the mute are multiplying 

Where silence o'er her treasure vigil keeps, 
And day by day the solemn mourners tread 
The grassless path down-beaten for the dead. 

III. 

But in the heart there is a vacant acre 

Which gentle charity hath set aside, 
Wherein she broods, an idle undertaker, 

And prays the death of doubt, and hate, and pride ;- 
Still on the beach the blue rush of the breaker 

Strews only lovely ruin, wild and wide, 
While malice, envy, error, cunning, crime, 
Sport with the storms, and scoff the toils of time. 

IV. 
Within her park the lovely sexton pineth 

Beneath the scowl of Eidolon despair, 
For o'er her paths the rank weed proudly twineth 

And strews fierce blossoms on her whitened hair ; 
She looks above, but scarce a wan star shineth 

Between the sullen cloud-racks gathered there, 
And by her gates the sable death-carts wind 
With fair dead children of the human mind. 



SHIFTING SHADOWS. 

V. 

What speeds detraction on its mad excursion ? 

What weights the wing of commendation down ? 
Why falls like lead the feather of aspersion ? 

Why floats like foam approval's golden crown ? 
What beam more fleet than whispers of aversion ! 

What snail so dilatory as renown ! 
For living hearts still bear the steel's cold thrust, 
While garlands deck the dumb, unconscious dust. 

VI. 

What boot life's homilies and pure epistles 
That plead unto the clod-encrusted soul ! 

The henbane of the heart, its thorns and thistles, 
Still gather dew from passion's brimming bowl, 

And hold high carnival though winter whistles 
From out adversity's inclement pole, 

But charity sobs at the ingleside 

Above her graves, o'ergrown, unoccupied. 



67 



TO MRS. HATTIE STEWART. 
I. 

I WOULD that as an eagle throws 
His image from the sky, 
Or as the petal of a rose 
Is wafted from its sweet repose 

By some Eolian sigh, 
The wraith of destiny may fling 
But truant shadows from his wing 
To pass, unpausing, by. 

II. 

I would that Love may richly dew 
Thy life with pleasure's wine, 

And spare thy cup the bitter rue 

With which he maddened mine; 

May time be golden, hearts be true; 

May starry footsteps twinkle through 

68 



SHIFTING SHADOWS, 

The garden of thy years, 
And scatter blooms, and fond perfumes, 
And music as of Pity's plumes, 

Beguiling Sorrow's tears. 

III. 
I would that as the seasons sink 

Into the mute unknown, 
Some gentle memory may link 

My name to Friendship's throne ; 
I would that I might dream, or think, 

When brooding and alone, 
That one bright bubble on the brink 

Of thought were all my own. 

IV. 

I wish the spirits of the air ? 

And earth, and fire, and sea, 
To crown thy soul's most silent prayer, 
And from thy footsteps sweep despair, 

Where'er thy path may be. 
I would that peace, and love, and rest, 
May make thy heart their common nest, 
And all things beautiful and best, 

I wish for thine and thee. 
6 9 



THE ICONOCLAST. 
I. 

A SWEEP of midnight hair — an eve whose glory 
Is flashed from out the furnace of the soul- 
A tongue attuned to love's sweet oratory — 

Red lips writ o'er with kisses as a scroll; 
And so you have the hero of my story: 

No sallow saint; no priest in cowl and stole; 
A common mortal twenty-six and past, 
Unmarried, wealthy, an iconoclast. 

II. 

As breathes a sighing night-wind through the willow, 
As to the pine a plaintive murmur clings, 

As on the beach the blue, incessant billow 
Its minor minstrelsy forever flings, 

A tender longing o'er the young man's pillow 
Outspread the sleepless shadow of its wings, 



SHIFTING SHADOWS. 



And launched him forth on Passion's painted ships 
To gather fruit that withered on his lips. 



III. 

A tourist first, unto the thousand-citied 

And rosy Orient his fancy led ; 
Ascended mountains where the frost-loom knitted 

A shroud about their summits cold and dead ; 
Then to the haunt of fig and palm tree flitted, 

Where history and legend weirdly wed, 
And wooed Cleopatra where star-beams smile 
Along the myth-wreathed waters of the Nile. 



IV. 

To Missolonghi, where were snapped asunder 

The golden strings of Byron's fierce, sweet lyre; 

To Africa, whose mute wastes quiver under 
The tawny lash of Fate's remorseless fire ; 

And much saw he whereat to gaze and wonder, 
But in his soul there lurked a wild desire, 

A nameless longing, deepest when he sighed, 

That travel eased not, nothing satisfied. 



SHIFTING SHADOWS. 

V. 

Along the dimpled disk of seas he drifted 
Before the waft of wanton kissing gales, 

While flossy shreds and flakes of sunlight sifted 
From out the milky mystery of sails, 

And phantom knights their spectral lances lifted 
In pale defiance over ghostly grails. 

But still the youth, upon the wave's blue page, 

No secret found his longing to assuage. 

VI. 

Then northward, where the fair Aurora's tresses, 

O'er-flecked with stars, bestrew the throbbing sky; 

Where Hecla looms o'er icy wildernesses 

And proudly flaunts his crimson plume on high; 

Where winter's thrall the fettered sea oppresses, 
And human bones the cold stars underlie; 

O'er blinking floes that cling about the pole 

He chased the fleeting fancies of the soul. 

VII. 

Then sought he peace in toil, it little mattered 
The nature or the name of the pursuit ; 



SHIFTING SHADOWS. 

His first fair dream was as a fragrance scattered- 
The tree of travel bore but ashen fruit; 

And so he desperately smote and shattered 

The idle image, smote it branch and root, 

And sought in commerce and in cent per cent 

The magical elixir of content. 



VIII. 

Swift argosies upon his pleasure waited 

With white wings bent above the purple tide, 

Before whose flight the fierce typhoon abated, 
And Zephyr but a perfumed pinion plied. 

Yet he was weary, disappointed, sated, 

And o'er the pyramids of gold he sighed, 

For in the honey of his proud success 

Still lurked the haunting, hollow bitterness. 



IX. 

And so he struck the idol into ashes, 

And sought nepenthe at another shrine ; 

Plunged headlong in the opal flood that flashes 
A languid lethe from its depths divine, 



SHIFTING SHADOWS. 

And kissed the siren from whose dreamy lashes 

Streams out the glory and the gloom of wine : 
Then to the phantom clung he close and fast, 
Conceiving he had found the balm at last. 

X. 

But as the months the fevered weeks succeeded, 
And nights of singing ushered days of sighs ; 

When time went limping by, or sped unheeded, 
And sleep was torture in a mad disguise ; 

When life's fair bloom, with white lips, mutely pleaded 
For one unsullied dew-drop from the skies — 

The wretched youth, with giant heave and thrust, 

Overthrew the carnal idol in the dust. 

XL 

About the shattered cup he lingered sadly, 

As o'er a dream too fair so soon to fade, 

And in a fond regret forgot how madly 

His sweetest hope was flattered and betrayed : 

Then reason swept the glowing fragments, gladly, 
Into a grave which Iron Will had made ; 

While o'er the wreck she wrapped, and tucked, and tied 

The pall-like mantles of remorse and pride. 



SHIFTING SHADOWS. 

XII. 
We leave our sins with footstep undecided, 

With backward stolen glance and frequent sigh ; 
But when from virtue we are once divided, 

To folly's arms we run, we rush, we fly ! 
For man's strange destiny was ever guided 

By hidden forces, wrenching it awry, 
And all of us some sweet misdeeds pursue, 
Forsaking old ones but to chase the new. 

XIII. 
From wine he wandered to the gaming-table. 

Where men with pallid cheeks and eyes of glass 
Sat statue-like amidst the heated Babel, 

To lose or win, to scatter or amass, 
And whether fortunate or not, unable 

The tempting tonic of the cup to pass ; 
For men who hazard ever fondly think 
To ride like bubbles on the beaker's brink. 

XIV. 

His horses all competitors outspeeded, 

His yacht was foremost of a gallant fleet; 

Success success in golden waves succeeded, 
And fortune's favors fluttered to his feet : 



SHIFTING SHADOWS. 

But in these triumphs there was something needed 

To qualify the universal sweet — 
A lacking flavor which his heart well knew 
Its loneliness and longing would subdue. 

XV. 

And then the painted image, wrought so newly, 
Was petulantly from its altar spurned; 

For o'er some dim and undiscovered thule, 
His restless spirit passionately yearned — 

Some tryst to which, still tenderly and truly, 
His heart in hungry expectation turned ; 

Some mystic spot within whose peaceful gloom, 

The rose of rest distills her rare perfume. 

XVI. 

Thus many fragile idols were erected, 

Insanely worshiped, fiercely overthrown ; 

But, hoping still, the dauntless youth selected 
Another image wrought of sober stone, 

Yet in whose searching eye his soul detected 
A kindred light to that within his own — 

A falcon glance, with never-folded wings, 

Which soared o'er great and swooped to little things. 

7 6 



SHIFTING SHADOWS. 

XVII. 
For Science now engaged his rapt attention, 

And on its wondrous pinion Thought took flight, 
And hung with studious and hushed suspension 

Among the dimmest distances of night, 
Or swept with swift and subtile apprehension 

The veil of tangled theories from sight, 
Nor knew he pause, nor daliance, nor rest, 
Until he lay on nature's vanquished breast. 

XVIII. 

With all the gracious sisterhood of flowers — 

The bleeding-heart, the pink, the eglantine — 

He held sweet converse, couching in the bowers, 
And dreaming dreams as fleeting as divine — 

Strange dreams that woke him in the starry hours, 
And thrilled along his veins like purple wine; 

Prophetic dreams that from the future stole 

The shadows of the wish within his soul. 

XIX. 

To him the tulip hung atilt with meaning, 

The jasmine breathed sweet creeds upon the air ; 

The milk-skinned lily on the swart rose leaning, 
Was to his heart a promise and a prayer; 



SHIFTING SHADOWS. 

While fancy 'mongst the blossoms went a-gleaning, 

And garnered sheaves of heavenly beauty there : 
Yet in it all there hid a mystic lore 
Whose depths he struggled vainly to explore. 

XX. 

And then he drew with tender indecision 
A veil about the image, but forbore 

To smite it with the turbulent derision 

Upheaped on idols loved and left before, 

For in the flow'rets dwelt a dreamy vision 

Whose blooming face a wreath of promise wore, 

And to his heart its blue eyes seemed to say 

That he should clasp his crown some happy day, 

XXI. 

And next he woke the mystery that slumbers 
In musing Poesy's o'er-blossomed strings ; 

Brimmed up the summer night with wooing numbers, 
And rained rich melody from fancy's wings, 

While every icy fetter that encumbers 

The heart notes, in their wilder flutterings, 

He swept aside, and soaring far and free, 

Shook out the carols of his ecstasy. 

78 



SHIFTING SHADOWS. 

XXII. 

And then one night a maiden stood before him, 
With love's rich bloom upon her peerless lips, 

Who flashed a thrill of sudden rapture o'er him 
From eves unused to sorrow's sad eclipse — 

Unclouded seas of azure that upbore him 

Upon their blue, as ocean bears her ships, 

And, in their dazzling depths, reposed the gem 

Which crowned his life's unfinished diadem. 

XXIII. 

As on a drifting cloud a star impinges, 

Translating all its blackness into bloom ; 

As morning with a kiss of crimson tinges 
The marble of an isolated tomb, 

The maiden's eyes behind their silken fringes 
Shone out upon the poet's life of gloom, 

And lighting up the shadows, grim and gray, 

Swept with a smile the long unrest away, 

XXIV. 

And when the autumn came with golden flushes, 
And rich-hued tracery of leaf and sky, 

In murmured vows and palpitating hushes, 

The twinkling twilights stole in rapture by ; 

79 



SHIFTING SHADOWS. 

While, on the maiden's cheek, the conscious blushes 

Were to the lover's plea a fond reply, 
Then on the pillow of his constant breast, 
The Idol of his life and love lay pressed. 

XXV. 

And here we leave him to his own resources, 
In proud possession of his charming bride, 

A candidate for quarrels and divorces, 

And all the wretched rest of it beside ; 

For true love runs in but contracted courses 
Since marriage knots so carelessly are tied 

That Hymen, with his air most cool and polished, 

Suggests that nuptial nonsense be abolished. 

XXVI. 

We leave the lady, too, with white arms twining 

About her husband, handsome, brave, and true ; 

And yet we part reluctantly, divining 

What racy single combats will ensue — 

What snaps and snarls ! what petulant repining ! 
And broomstick battles ! Yes, we sadly rue 

The parting, but 'twill always be the same ; 

She'll change the trouble with a change of name. 

80 



SHIFTING SHADOWS. 

XXVII. 

And so the story, carried to conclusion, 

Would blossom to a wild, fantastic play, 

Its moral, chaos, and its plot, confusion, 
Its heroes, husbands deftly put away, 

Its heroines, a beautiful illusion, 

Its epilogue the trump of judgment-day : 

We therefore o'er the scene a curtain draw, 

And leave the happy pair to love — and law. 



(6) 81 



LAQUELLE ? 

MERRY eyes, now gray, now blue, 
Yearning, laughing, tender, true ; 
Lips as red as rarest roses 
Orient garden ever grew, 

Velvet cheeks whose bloom discloses 
Eden's fairest charms anew ; 
Luscious maid I love so well, 
Young and beautiful — laquelle ? 

In the wind's song, wild and free, 

Sings no voice so sweet to me 

As the sigh her thoughts compel, 
Broken sighs and soft that tell 

Every tender ecstasy — 

Loved and lovely maid — laquelle ? 



THE PHANTOM BARQUE. 
I. 

UPON an island in the sea of time 
I watched, and waited : 
And presently, from out some starry clime, 

From out the years, with love and passion freighted, 
Across the rolling" reach of tides sublime 

A sail appeared. Oh ! how the moments grated 
O'er harsh impediments, with dull delay, 
Until the barque was anchored in the bay. 

II. 
Then stole a wondrous maid my senses o'er, 

As in my dreaming 
Full often had she sweetly swept before, 

Her tropic tresses prodigally streaming, 
Like sunshine washing some celestial shore ; 

And I fell down and worshiped, fondly deeming 

83 



SHIFTING SHADOWS. 

That in the hazel rapture of her eye 
No love could languish, no devotion die. 

III. 

The days rushed by like rubies, brief and bright, 

Like pearls outscattered 
By gentle angels in ecstatic flight : 

And then, alas ! Disaster shook her tattered 
And gloomy banner to the weeping night, 

While winds of desolation smote and shattered 
The brittle fabric of my love and trust, 
And whirled its starry fragments in the dust. 

IV. 

Upon the isle, the lone and silent isle, 

I still am biding ; 
And gazing o'er the watery wastes I smile 

To find my heart with hope its dreams dividing- 
The dreary hope, which time may not beguile, 

That if the radiant barque the waves be riding 
In earth's remotest and most stormy sea, 
It may come back, though but a wreck, to me. 



8 4 



TOLL THE BELL. 

TOLL the bell, the iron-throated 
Bell despairful ! 
Let its tidings be outfloated, 

Sad and prayerful, 
From each spire and dome and steeple, 
As a warning to the people, 

As a voice from heaven sped ; 
As a note of tender pity 
From the silence of the city 

Of the dead ! 

Toll ! And may its melancholy, 

Deep and solemn, 
Crush the heart's incessant folly 

As a column ! 
May its clamor, far outreaching, 
More than dreary wastes of preaching, 

85 



SHIFTING SHADOWS. 

Peal at Pleasure's shrine, 
Ever calling, and enthralling, 
With an eloquence appalling, 

Terrible, divine ! 

Yesterday the clay was glowing, 

Now 'tis ashes ! 
And the cup of Fate, o'erflowing, 

Grimly dashes 
On the vital spark its wave — 

Gloomy wave which ever lashes, 

And in sullen silence plashes 
On its shore, the grave ! 

Ah ! to live is oft to languish 

And repine, 
Since around our dreamings anguish 

Must entwine ; 
And the pale thing, named Hereafter, 
From the dimpled lip of Laughter 

Sweeps the summer bloom ; 
While before his cold eye, Pleasure, 
Casting down love's beaded measure, 

Totters to the tomb. 

86 



SHIFTING SHADOWS. 

Toll, sexton ! Let thy muffled 

Dirge begin, 
For another soul hath shuffled 

Off its sin. 
Toll, O sexton, warped and bended, 
From the dead old years descended, 

Toll thy monody ! 
For the next wild note that clashes 
Over mute, dismantled ashes 

May be rung for thee ! 



87 



FATE. 

I. 

SHE stands before me, but I cannot know 
1 The strange, swift lights that glow 
Within her great sad eyes, 
That like the shifting and inconstant skies 
Are masking ever in some weird disguise, 

Now beautifully blue, 
And now like midnight, with fierce lightnings fusing 
through. 

II. 

Between the crimson cleavage of her lips 

A sigh full often slips, 

And shadows, gaunt and gray, 
Across their bloom in wan procession stray, 
Like death-bells tolling on a bridal-day — 

Like ghostly footed snows, 
Whose crystal kisses blanch the blushes of the rose. 



SHIFTING SHADOWS. 

III. 
I wander o'er the mountains and the tides 

Where'er her footstep guides ; 

Through tangled, tender hours 
That twine their blossoms in life's secret bowers, 
And then into the wailing storm which lowers 

Along the patient years, 
And on my soul outpours the tempest of its tears. 

IV. 

Through cloistered sorrow's sacristy she lingers 

Where cruel beaks and fingers 

My bleeding heart assail ; 
Then out into the fragrance-freighted gale — 
Still on forever to the portal pale, 

Death's wan and waiting gate — 
Whereto my guide conducts me, for her name is Fate. 



REVERIES. 

THE night is dark without; the sobbing rain 
Beats baffled at the spattered window pane, 
Imploring, like some spirit of the night 
A moment pausing in its starless flight 
To pray admittance. So I sit, and think, 
While in the blackened grate the bright coals wink 
Suggestive, and I watch the golden stars 
That from their dungeon, and its iron bars, 
In shining troops depart. 



Out from the aisles 
Of some dim sanctuary gaylv files 
A bridal train, while roses underlie 
Their footsteps fragrantly, and seem to sigh 
A sacrificial blessing. Light of heart 
They pass the sacred portal; tears may start, 
And fall upon the rose-leaves, but they rise 



SHIFTING SHADOWS. 



Belit with smiles into the joyous eyes 
That beam as bright as Venus in the skies. 



I look out from the casement, and the rain 

Beats baffled at the spattered window pane ; 

I watch the sodden sky, the dripping night. 

To see if still the sparks pursue their flight : 

But all is dark ! The clouds bowl blackly by ; 

The wind sweeps through the cedar with a sigh, 

And in the dim expanse of heaven I see 

No point of brightness which a spark might be. 

Then to my sofa, and I sit and think, 

While in the blackened grate the red coals wink 

Prophetic, and each waving spire of flame 

Becomes a monument, whereon no name 

Is written. 

% % % % % 

Down the hushed and solemn aisles 
Of that dim sanctuary slowly files 
A burial train. The roses still are there, 
But bruised and broken ; and the thorns are bare 
And brittle. Happy feet no fragrance press 
From their dead leaves — and all is bitterness. 

9 1 



MY BOY. 

I. 

THEY say that he is dead — my baby boy, 
My little gentleman with flaxen tresses; 
Departed from these treasured-up caresses 
Which I had thought so fondly to employ: 

Forever gone ! while sad and empty dresses, 
And here and there a consecrated toy 
Are eloquent with such a mighty pain, 
That he is wrested back from heaven again. 

II, 

A stranger closed his eyes, his deep blue eyes, 
So like to violets, and starry seas — 
A stranger drew the curtain over these, 

While Death stood gloating o'er his ravished prize, 
Which, with his skeleton and brazen keys, 

He had unlocked, and to the waiting skies 

92 



SHIFTING SHADOWS. 

Let out the 'prisoned spirit, pure and white, 
Which heavenward took its seraph-guided flight. 

III. 

It booteth not ray lost one to repine, 

My loved, my little one no more forever ! 
'Twere better I had known the darling never 
Than thus the reaching heart-strings should entwine 

About a sword-like grief, which can but sever 
The coiling tendrils from the bleeding vine : 
And yet these arms of love, though cloven down, 
Shoot out anew to clasp their sorrow's crown. 

IV. 

His footsteps patter through the solitude 
And dreary isolation of existence, 
With such a musical and soft insistence, 

That from its loss my love is warped, and wooed. 
And wafted to that dim, delightful distance 

Beyond the azure where the stars are strewed ; 

And like a bark on some celestial sea, 

Affection anchors in eternity. 



MISERERE. 

WE stood in the glorious, golden dawn 
Of a new delightful day, 
And the sunlight fell like a spirit spell 
On the bonnie brown locks I love so well, 
And I looked the devotion no tongue can tell, 
And a passion no pen portray. 

O sweet was the dawn of that fair day, 
With its pendulous hopes a-bloom ; 
But a tempest, apace, smote the heaven's fair face, 
And brushed from the future all token and trace 
Of wooing perfume, with its finger of gloom, 
And wrought, with a terrible skill, in its place 
A tomb. 

And now, in the desolate waste of years, 
In the desert of grief, I grope ; 



SHIFTING SHADOWS. 

For death unto distance yields cruel assistance. 
And life is not life, it is merely existence, 
While memory dashes swift tears o'er the ashes 
That bury the beacon of hope. 

We stand in the gloom of some cold curse, 

In the palm of a pressing pain, 
And I sigh for the birth of a happier morn, 
When sunlight the bonnie brown locks may adorn; 
Or else, that the sharpest and bitterest thorn 
That grows o'er the head of the dear and the dead 

May rivet our hearts again. 



95 



THE HEART. 

4t f\ HEART!" the maiden cries, the sighing 
\ < _ > / maiden ; 

"0 chalice, sparkling over with delight! 
Thou happy bird with ecstasy down-laden 

That makest music through the starry night ! 

Thou buoyant bark, whose palpitating flight 
Is guided on to love's delicious Aidenn ! 
O trusting heart! O heart with joy oppressed, 
Thou makest heavenly anguish in my breast/' 

" O loving heart ! Thou heart upheaped with roses ! 
A radiant mother softly murmurs this: 

" O yearning heart, whose fond arm sweetly closes 
About its new-born rapture ! Heart of bliss, 
Thou couch, more downy than an angel's kiss, 

Whereon my bright-eyed darling hushed reposes — 

9 6 



SHIFTING SHADOWS. 

Rock gently, heart, within my joyous breast, 
The birdling slumbers in its swaying nest.' 7 

" O weary heart, in ashes unavailing I" 

A bended figure breathes : " O muffled tomb, 
Above whose clay the kites of death are sailing 
. To mark the ashen prey they shall consume I 
O sepulcher of life's most sweet perfume, 
And grave of love ! Alas ! the day is failing, 
And thou, O cruel heart, shalt yield me rest,, 
A broken thorn within an icy breast.'' 



(7) 97 



TO ATLANTA. 

BUT yesterday the wild bird built her nest, 
And reared her brood of little ones, where now 
Thy proudest monuments confine the hum 
And hurry of a multitude. Along 
Thy busy marts, one thinks he almost hears 
The music of the brook, which erstwhile ran 
Discoursive through the flags and flowerets: and 
At night, when muffled falls the footstep far 
Of guardsman on his rounds, attentive ears 
Can catch the echo of the robin's call, 
And seem to hear the mottled partridge cry 
Within his rosy fastnesses. Anon 
A spirit finger from the pine-harp's strings 
An anthem sweepeth, and the forest sings 
An undertone of melody. 



SHIFTING SHADOWS. 

The ax 
Seems still to ring along thy thoroughfares, 
Responsive to the brawny arm of toil ; 
And at the eventide thy flagstones bloom, 
Or seem to bloom, with violets. The wheels 
Of thy fast multiplying industries 
Are garlanded with blossoms till they trail 
Upon the highway, and the eager feet 
Of energy press fragrance from their leaves, 
Until thou might'st have been by magic built 
Mysteriously in a single night 
Upon a couch of flowers. 

In the gloom 
Thy temples cast, where browsed the deer, 
And burrowed close the fleecy rabbit, now 
The stately cedars nod their solemn plumes, 
And guard like tireless sentinels the still 
And sacred acre ; while from slated spire 
And heavenward-lifted dome, and chapel loft, 
The mellow bells with silver voices call 
To Christian worship. 

With the whistle shrill 
Of engines straining through thy throbbing heart 

99 



SHIFTING SHADOWS. 

The winding horns of hunters seem to blend, 

And as from startled hills the echoes come, 

Imagination sees the stay in flight 

Across the honeysuckled distance: there, 

Excitedly in hot pursuit, the lank 

And panting hounds; beyond, the riders — fast 

They follow, and the forest wraps them in. 

The drays upon the cobble-stones are but 

The rattle of the horses on the plain, 

And from the mountain falls a low refrain 

Of winding horns, and all is hushed again. 

Fair city of the south, God speed thee ! may 

Thy future be through blossoms hanging fair 

And sweet athwart thy path. Child of the woods, 

Thy proud escutcheon be the kingly oak 

Whose throne within the virgin solitudes 

Thy queenly arm overthrew, and in the wealth 

Of thine unbraided tresses I would weave 

This humble chaplet, for as blushed 

The dove-eyed Venus from the lisping sea, 

So from the chalice of the wild rose grew 

Thy wondrous charms, Atlanta. 



THE DOVE AND THE MAIDEN. 

THE sad dove sits in her dim retreat 
In the wild wood, hushed and lone, 
And never a note is heard in her throat 

Save now and anon a moan. 
A light wing comes on the balmy air 

And gladdens the waiting dove, 
Then off to the hills and the glistening rills 
She hies with her cooing love. 

A maiden stands in the slanting glow 

Of the amber-dripping west, 
But not in her dreams are its yellow beams, 

Nor the star with the crimson crest. 
A footstep sounds on the gravel walk, 

A footstep glad and free ; 
And the maiden can bide no thought beside, 

"Mv darling comes back to me!" 



THE FEVER. 
I. 

HE stood in the twilight as the stars 
Grew golden in the sky, 
And never a word his pale lips stirred 

Save "Kiss me/' and "Good by;" 
Then she to her lonely grief, and he 

In the path where duty led — 
To the city of graves and sobbing waves, 
The city of the dead. 

II. 
Rosy of cheek and strong of limb, 

And sturdy of heart was he ; 
But the yellow fiend's call was in hovel and hall,. 
And the city was wrapped in a deathly pall, 

The city beside the sea. 



SHIFTING SHADOWS. 

He stood by the couch of rich and poor, 

Through weary night and day, 
Watching the spark go out in the dark, 
And cruel death come, stiff and stark, 

And fasten upon the clay : 
And he thought of the twilight when the stars 

Grew golden in the sky ; 
When never a word his lips had stirred 

Save k< Kiss me,", and ''Good by." 

III. 

Hither and thither the death carts sped, 

And the city was wan with woe ; 
For never a spot had death forgot, 
And crape hung down from castle and cot, 

And the waving wind breathed low. 
Fair were the stars and bright the dew, 

But how could the people know ! 
For the men were cowed and the women were bowed* 
Fearing to comfort each other aloud, 
And the moonlight hung like a saffron shroud 

On the prostrate earth below. 



SHIFTING SHADOWS. 



IV. 



She sat in her mountain home afar, 

And sad was her heart in its pain ; 
For the summer was fled, and the blossoms were dead, 
And the spirit-winds, tossing the broken leaves, said, 

"He will not come back again." 
And she thought of the twilight when the stars 

Grew golden in the sky, 
When never a word his pale lips stirred 

Save "Kiss me," and "Good by." 



She pined in her dreary mountain home, 

For the wintry sky was gray ; 
And her heart beat low as the sifting snow 
Fell on the hills and the bottoms below, 
And feeling her sad heart wed to woe, 

She knelt her down to pray. 
And she prayed : " If God be a merciful God, 

In pity look down on me! 
And save him from harms, to these empty arms, 

In the city beside the sea." 



SHIFTING SHADOWS. 

She lifted her face from the dust — " Thank God !" 
And she rushed to her darling's breast; 

For the saffron king, on his fatal wing, 

Had claimed him not as an offering, . 

And she clung to him close, like some tenderest thing, 
And sobbed herself to rest. 

VI. 

And so while the snow-flakes fluttered down, 

Like blanched buds from the sky, 
Full many a word his rich lips stirred, 
And "Kiss me, sweetheart," oft was heard, 

But never again "Good by." 



THE BLOSSOM AND THE BREEZE. 

I. 

THERE was a blossom fairer far 
Than lilies are, 
And sweeter than the sweetest rose 

That overflows 
With fragrant sighs beneath the skies, 

To twilight's glorious star. 

II. 

And to this blossom, pure and bright, 
One glowing night, 

A breeze from haunts of summer seas 
And orange-trees, 

By some fierce spell, no tongue may tell, 
Was guided in his flight. 
1 06 



SHIFTING SHADOWS. 

III. 
The fond wind from his waving plumes 

Shook thick perfumes, 
And sighed as sadly as the pale 

And spectral gale, 
Whose melancholy pinions trail 

O'er long-forgotten tombs. 

IV. 

Then, on the cradle of his breast, 
He rocked to rest 

The wondrous glory of the flower, 
That blissful hour, 

And softly sung with honeyed tongue 

To her he loved the best. 

V. 

O, tender was the truth, and true, 
Between the two, 

When to her lover's wooing arms, 

Her blushing charms, 

The blossom bright, that starry night, 
So passionately threw. 
107 



SHIFTING SHADOWS. 

VI. 

But suddenly a shadow stole 

Across the soul 
* Of blossom and of breeze — a shape 

With wings of crape, 
That urged its flight athwart the night 

From out the frozen pole. 

VII. 

Then from the blossom's cheek the red 

In terror fled, 
While silently about her charms 

The ghostly arms 
Wove out of ice, in strange device, 

A shroud — for she was dead. 

VIII. 

And then the sad wind strewed the flowers, 
Through night's long hours, 

With bootless tears ; and in the fir 
He mourned for her 

With all those sweet appeals that stir 

These human hearts of ours. 

108 



SHIFTING SHADOWS. 

IX. 

But still unto the wind's sad wing 
Sweet odors cling — 

Fond waftures from life's faded bloom, 
The soul's perfume ; 

And evermore the twilights bring 

The breeze unto the tomb. 



109 



BABY'S PRAYER. 

THE mute white snow-flakes drifted 
From a 'dim and dusky sky, 
And my darling's eyes were lifted 

From a sweet face, soft and shy, 
As the firelight shone and shifted, 

And the Christmas-tide drew nigh. 

She sat at my feet in silence, 

And I knew some deep request 

Like a prayer was hung on her silent tongue, 
That a fond hope was suppressed, 

That a song in the soul was still unsung, 
Like a tune in a dreamer's breast. 

Then I smoothed her fluffy tresses 
And sought for the hidden cause, 

And said, " What is it oppresses 

My child?" Then, after a pause, 



SHIFTING SHADOWS. 

She said, "Please, mamma, I duesses 
I'll wite to dood Santa Glaus !" 

So she sat in the glow of the firelight, 
With paper and ink and pen, 

And wrote : "I pray that Santa Claus may 
Bring candy and nuts agen ; 

But he mustn't fordet a nice tea-set, 
For Desus Christ's sake, amen." 

And when on the fateful morning 

The stocking hung huge and fair, 

With fat sides swelling as cunningly telling 
The treasures in ambush there, 

She cried in delight, all crimson and white, 

And beautiful after the balm of the night, 
" O mamma, he answered my prayer ! " 

And I pray that the heavenly Giver, 

The giver of gifts divine, 
May shelter from harm with his mighty arm 

This opening bud of mine, 
And take it to rest on his gentle breast 

When loosed from its earthly vine. 



LEGEND OF THE K1SSIMMEE. 



I. 

FULL many a long, long year ago, 
In the land of sighing pines, 
Where the daintiest blossoms . forever blow, 
And the breath of the breeze is as sweetly low 
As a love-song in the vines, 



II. 

A dark-eyed Indian maid abode, 

With a heart still proudly free, 
For the hand of fate had opened the gate 
Which darkens the years, and bade her wait, 
And she bowed to the mystery. 



SHIFTING SHADOWS. 



III. 

Full many a dusky suitor came 

And wooed in the dewy hours ; 
But her virgin breast was still unpressed 
When she threw her olive charms to rest 
On her fragrant couch of flowers. 



IV. 

And then, one warm and languorous eve, 

With a new and strange delight, 
She heard a crush of the underbrush, 
And her heart beat audibly in the hush 
Of the still and starry night; 



For out of the shadows strode a youth 

With a golden cloud of hair, 
And a sweet blue eye, like an April sky„ 
Over which the clouds like shadows fly 
To leave it still more fair. 

(8) 113 



SHIFTING SHADOWS. 



VI. 

The star-rays fell in a storm of light, 

And the man and the maid were dumb ; 
But the girl's great eyes shone under the skies 
With a luminous, glad, and soft surprise, 
For she felt that her fate had come. 

VII. 

And when from the stranger's rose-red lips 

A quaint sweet murmur fell, 
She knew what it meant by the thrill it sent 
To her longing heart — and she was content 

To look what she could not tell. 

VIII. 

And the nut-brown arms reached out and up, 

With a touching and tender grace, 
And she hung at rest on her idol's breast 
As her passionate heart was fondly pressed 
In the fold of his sweet embrace. 



SHIFTING SHADOWS. 



IX. 



Full many a moon had waxed and waned, 

And the youth with the golden hair 
Still murmured of love to his wildwood dove, 
While blossoms rained down from the bowers above 
And gladdened the glowing air. 



X. 

And the loved and loving Indian maid 

In her mate's strange language cooed, 
But its dreariest note in her golden throat 
From a hidden harp-string seemed to float 
In the flowery solitude. 



XI. 

One warm October afternoon 

This youth of the maiden's heart, 
With bow in hand, by the silver sand 
Of a river which coursed through that fair land, 
Was aiming his deadly dart. 



SHIFTING SHADOWS. 



XII. 

For his ear had caught the snap of a twig 
'Neath the weight of a cautious tread > 
And the sudden sway of a myrtle spray 
Unveiled a glimpse of his lurking prey 
In its fresh and flowery bed. 



XIII. 

A twang of the bow-string, and the flash 

And flight of the cruel dart, 
And the maiden lay in the shadows gray, 
Sighing her true young soul away 
On her husband's broken heart. 



XIV. 

She told the tale of her loneliness, 

And her quest by the rivers brink 
For the form so fair, with its golden hair, 
For she knew that his step would tarry there 
Till the deer came down to drink. 



SHIFTING SHADOWS. 



XV. 

And then as her life was drifting out 
To the weird and waveless sea, 
With a queenly grace she swept the trace 
Of a tear from her darling's livid face, 
And said, "Sweet love, kissa me!" 



XVI. 

And so with that sad and pure embrace 

On her quivering lips impressed, 
Her life's young flower from its earthly bower 
Was caught to the stars in the twilight hour, 
And laid upon mercy's breast. 



XVII. 

'Twas many a long, long year ago, 
But the Indian maid's request 
Shall ever abide the name of the tide 
Upon whose tropical bank she died, 
And where her ashes rest. 



PAWNING THE PETTICOAT. 



I. 

YES, stranger, those was high old times, 
And seem' as how it's you, 
I'll mention the job we worked on Bob 

In eighteen fifty-two. 
Well, yes ; if you think a previous drink 
Wud hurry the story through. 



II. 

You see this Bob was a tenderfoot, 

But he had onusule eyes 
That showed the stuff ter weaken a rough, 

An' stands in the place of size ; 
So the boys agreed that he wouldn't bluff, 

Which no one yet denies. 



SHIFTING SHADOWS, 

III. 

Well, stranger, arter a lengthy spell, 

Which I am proud ter say, 
Bob struck it rich with a sluicin' ditch 

An' tuk out thundering pay, 
Then treated the town, from the bar-keep down, 

An' left on the follerin' day. 

IV. 

Some six or eight months arterwards, 

When the boys was on a spree, 
A-slingin' the dust in the way the wust 

Perhaps that ever I see, 
Ole Flowery Pete riz up on his feet 

An' fired a wink at me. 

V. 

An' layin' his holt on my shoulder, so, 

A-seekin' the natur'l plumb, 
He drug me up ter the soshil cup 

(Containin' the best of rum), 
An' takin' «a most almighty dost, 

Remarked, " Miss Bob has come !" 



SHIFTING SHADOWS. 

VI. 

Ag'in? — say, stranger, I'm not dry, 

Onless — well, gimme a sweet; 
Or what do you think of the soshil drink 

I took with Flowery Pete? 
Jest suits? That's me! so here we be, 

An' may we ofting meet. 

VII. 
I circled around, you may believe, 

A-scatterin' wide the news ; 
A-tellia' the boys ter quit the'r noise, 

An' gatherin' diffrunt views ; 
An' it was agreed that the gal Pete seed 

Was purty as dancin' shoes. 

VIII. 

But women had never come before, 

An' Bob had shook the gang ; 
So the Jedge and me talked privatelee, 

While Pete an' the fellers sang; 
But we couldn't decide what ter do with the bride 

In case it was a hang. 



SHIFTING SHADOWS. 

IX. 

It wasn't the gal so much, you know, 

We sorter give in ter that, 
But women will bring sich an endless string 

Of parsons, ter pass the hat; 
So me an' the Jedge was clean on edge, 

Like the tail of a tousled cat. 

X. 

We couldn't agree, the Jedge an' me, 
So we went for a soshil glass, 

An ; it helped me some, fur an idee come 
I didn't allow ter pass, 

So I told the boys ter quit the'r noise 
An' form in a judgment class. 

XL 

An' then we helt a kinder court, 
An' the case was fairly tried — 

Fur the Jedge an' me was sober, you see 
(Which never has been denied), 

.An' we finerly said, that alive or dead, 
The boys should see the bride. 



SHIFTING SHADOWS. 

XII. 
An' that ain't all — the court an' me 

Composed the plaintive's fine, 
A mild invite, in words perlite, 

Fur Bob ter furnish the wine ; 
Then Flowery Pete waltzed inter the sireet 

An' formed us in a line. 

XIII. 

The boys was very quiet like, 
But walked in ways amazin', 

An' the Jedge an' me was constantlee 
Kept wonderin' an' a-gazin'; 

Fur I must say them boys that day 
Showed terrible good raisin'. 

XIV. 

We halted at the cabin gate, 

An' the Jedge an' me went in, 

An' we found the lass at her lookin'-glass 
A-fixin' a diamon' pin : 

An' the Jedge was red all over his head 
A-wonderin' whar ter begin. 



SHIFTING SHADOWS. 

XV. 

An' I never see a purtier face 

Than I see thar an' then, 
Fur her doe-like eyes was a fine surprise 

At the mob of drunken men ; 
So the Jedge an' me says soothinlee, 

"Thar's only a hundred an' ten!" 

XVI. 

Then we perlitely ast fur Bob, 

But he was at the mine ; 
So we bowed as low as our heads wud go, 

An' j'ined the staggerin' line ; 
But the boys was as full as a tick on a bull, 

An' howled fur a tank of wine. 

XVII. 
Then Pete stepped forth an' spoke a piece, 

An', stranger, you'd a died ! 
He said as Bob was off at his job, 

Supposin' we pawned the bride, 
An' Bob's ole mar' a-standin' thar 

Wud give 'er a way-up ride. 



SHIFTING SHADOWS. 

XVIII. 

I don't know how it happened next, 

But somehow Flowery Pete 
Come out with the bride, rigged up fur a ride, 

An' lookin' tremenjous sweet; 
An' her cheeks was red — so the fellers said — 

An' tender enough ter eat. 

XIX. 

An' so we fetched Miss Bob ter the bar, 

An' read what we had wrote, 
When Pete, like a fool, clomb up on a stool 

An' called for a risin' vote ! 
But we shet him up with a soshil cup 

An' mortgaged the petticoat. 

XX. 

Another, stranger? Well, I will, 

If this makes — yes, makes two: 
I'll take the same, which I need not name, 

A drop of the soshil dew; 
An' here's success ter yer little game, 

An' health an' wealth ter you. 
124 



SHIFTING SHADOWS. 

XXI. 

Well, that's about the way it was, 
An' the boys got squar'ly blind ; 
. But the Jedge an' me kept sober ter see 
How Bob wud show his mind ; 
But he paid the bill with a right good-will, 
An' galloped the mar ; back down the hill, 
A-packin' his wife behind. 

XXII. 

An' sence that time Miss Bob has been 
The purtiest gal that grows, 

Fur the boys confess she ain't no less 
Than a saint in female close — 

Which same ter deny is a weepin' eye, 
An' the bloodiest sort of nose. 

XXIII. 

Well, good by, stranger : call ag'in ; 

An' are you travelin' fur? 
It's no more good in Cottonwood, 

An' the times ain't got no stir- 
Say ! up the street — that's Flowery Pete, 

A-walkin' along o' her. 



OREGON SUE. 

A Legend of '53. 

I. 

WELL, stranger, here you are ag'in ; 
Now take a smile with me : 
Jest kind of light, an' bide all night, 

For board an' bed is free — 
Not countin' a yarn you'd like ter Tarn — 
Come in ! What shall it be? 

II. 

The same? Now that is soshil like, 

So here's a-lookin' ter you ; 
An' here's ter the wife — what ! dern my life 

If I ain't heard you'd two ! 
Well, here's may you find a lass ter your mind, 

A lovin' one, an' a true. 
126 



SHIFTING SHADOWS. 

III. 

Jest set down while I stir the fire 
An' tumble the nag some hay, 

For you an' the brute is in cahoot 
A-honorin' me this day : 

So freeze ter a seat an' toast your feet — 
I won't be gone ter stay. 

% % # % : 

IV. 

The yarn? Well, back in 'fifty-three 
The wimmen was raly few, 

So Flowery Pete got frightful sweet 
On a Injin gal he knew ; 

An' I seldom see two folks agree 
Like him an' Oregon Sue. 

V. 

An' this I say, that an ugly mug 
Belongs ter the Injin race, 

But Oregon Sue was white cl'ar through 
In spite of her yaller face, 

An' her close was clean as ever I seen 
In the most respectful place. 



SHIFTING SHADOWS. 

VI. 

So the Jedge an' me, accordin'lee, 

Without a blot or flaw, 
D rawed up a writ a-statin' it 

That Pete could take the squaw ; 
An' the boys all signed, for ter make it bind r 

Providin' it come ter law. 

VII. 

An' arter the sarvice Pete an' Sue 

Remained thar, side by side, 
For well they knew the entire crew 

Was waitin* ter kiss the bride ; 
An' when it was done, an' Pete took one, 

She fell on his neck an' cried. 

VIII. 

It wasn't the thing, perhaps, ter do, 

But the boys agreed with me, 
That she went ter rest on her pardner's breast. 

The sweetest that ever we see — 
A-lookin', we said, like a rosebud red, 

A-twinin' around a tree. 



SHIFTING SHADOWS. 

IX. 
An', strange as it sounds, the last man thar 

Was actin' the plainest lie, 
Ter make it appear it wasn't a tear 

A-gatherin' in his eye; 
But the Jedge an" me could certingly see 

Thar wasn't a dern one dry. 

X. 

An' thinkin' the gal was lonesome like, 
With nothin' but men in sight, 

We straggled away with nothin' ter say, 
An' dodged about in the night ; 

An' my partin' view was Oregon Sue 
A-huggm* him clost an 5 tight. 

XI. 

Well, in them days the Injun tribes 
Was buckin' in ways severe ; 

An' signal-lights shone out o' nights 
On the mountings, fur and near ; 

But Flowery's bride bein' on our side, 

We didn't have much ter fear. 
( 9 ) 129 



SHIFTING SHADOWS. 

XII. 

One night she seen the suddent flash 

Of a green, ontisule star, 
An' she said it meant that the tribes was bent 

On liftin' the miners' ha'r — 
An' you may believe, which I won't deceive, 

They come — an' they found us thar ! 

XIII. 
We left Miss Bob an' Oregon Sue 

With a guard drawed out ter stay, 
Then inter the shade' that the mountings made 

We silently stole away, 
As willin' — as glad — ter fight by night 

As ever we was by day. 

XIV. 

But Sue got out and dodged the guard, 

An' never lost sight of Pete ; 
An' the boys all say she blazed away 

In a style it was hard ter beat ; 
An' Pete was as proud as a tipsy crowd 

A-packin' her down the street. 



SHIFTING SHADOWS. 

XV. 

The signal-fires still blazed around, 
But the imps was monstrous shy, 

For well they knew that Oregon Sue 
Could sleep with an open eye ; 

An' venturin' out was gitten about 
The same thing as ter die. 

XVI. 

So winter come. 'Twas Christmas eve — 
That's right ! Don't wait for me ; 

You want it hot ? As well as not — 
That's Flowery ter a T, 

An' Oregon Sue could mix a stew 
The touchin'est ever I see. 

XVII. 

Well, stranger, snow was driftin' fast, 

In flakes so wide acrost 
That Flowery Pete a-crossin' the street 

Come dern nigh gitten lost; 
But we warmed him up with a soshil cup, 

An' laughed at the fallin' frost. 



SHIFTING SHADOWS. 

XVIII. 

An 5 airly Christmas day, when we 
Was pilotin' Pete ter bed, 

Thar wasn't a stick nor stone nor brick 
Ter kiver his curly head ; 

An' under the snow, by a broken bow, 
The pride of his life lay dead. 

XIX. 

We planted her under an old oak tree, 
A-keepin' the fact in mind, 

That lettin' the bark be ever so dark, 
A white heart hides behind ; 

An' Oregon Sue had a soul as true 
As the fairest of womankind. 



DEAD MAN'S BAR. 
I. 

THEY used ter call this Dead Man's Bar, 
And if you wish the why, 
I happen ter know how come it so 

(Which no one will deny); 
For I worked here then, with a gang of men, 
In the claim you're settin' by. 

II. 

One day while techin' off a blast, 

With somethhV else in mind, 
, A man was blowed in a way we knowed 

Wud finerly make him blind ; 
So we sent him East. with a rattlin' beast, 

An' the best guide we could find. 

133 



SHIFTING SHADOWS. 

III. 

The guide, his name was Portagee Joe, 

A yallerish-lookin' case, 
With here an' thar a stragglin' ha'r 

A-hangin' in keerless grace, 
But his eyes was keen as ever I seen 

In a livin' human's face. 

IV. 

The boys all come ter the startin 5 out, 

An' we sent 'm off in style,, 
Full up ter the chin with the best of gin,. 

An' bottles for arter a while ; 
An' the bags of dust, from last to fust, 

Was a most respectful pile. 

V. 

We stood right whar we're settin' now, 
An' watched 'm climb the trail, 

An' the last we heard was a grateful word- ( 
In the blind man's partin' hail ; 

So I turned away with my heart that day 
As big as a yearlin' whale. 



SHIFTING SHADOWS. 

VI. 

We kinder knocked off work that day, 

Because the boys all said 
That goin' away ter the East to stay 

Was somethin' like goin' dead; 
So we writ a pome on the joys of home, 

Which the drunken bar-keep read. 

VII. 

Next day a rumer come ter camp, 

That wasn't believed by me, 
Which said that Joe was seed ter go 

A-boatin' — which might be — 
But it was shown he was alone, 
An' paddlin 5 for the sea. 

VIII. 

That day we found the blind man, dead, 

W T ith his rattlin' beast clost by, 
An' the boys all felt like the'r hearts wud melt 

(Not bein' the gang ter cry), 
For they couldn't unsay that goin' away 

Was pretty much like ter die. 



SHIFTING SHADOWS. 

IX. 
We buried him by that biggest fir, 

But we didn't turn on no pray'r, 
For we all agreed that he had no need 

Of help that a man could spar' ; 
An* we put it down that he'd git his crown, 

If heaven was on the squar'. 

X. 

Well, Portagee Joe had stole a boat, 
For the trail he knowed full well 

Wud give us a clew we'd foller cl'ar through 
Ter Afriky or ter hell ; 

So he took the boat, a-hopin 5 ter float, 
Whar nothin' was left ter tell. 

XI. 

But show me a craft in the univarse 
Can paddle the Klamath through, 

For the shoals an' rocks etarnally knocks 
The best of 'm black an' blue ; 

An' arter a while — I'll give 'm a mile — 
The stoutest is broke in two. 
136 



SHIFTING SHADOWS. 

XII. 

So Joe an' the gin an' the dust went down, 
But the boat was washed ashore, 

The sorriest wreck, I do expeck, 
That ever was seed before ; 

But the onery guide slunk under the tide, 
And never come up no more. 

XIII. 
Well, well ! It's many a good long year 

Sence plantin' the blind one thar ; 
But my stifFnin' j'ints is the only p'ints 

(An 5 the whit'nin 7 of my ha'r) 
That makes me know how long ago 

I mined on Dead Man's Bar. 



137 



THE GROWL OF THE GOLD- 
DIGGER. 

I. 

I AIN'T no hand ter kick or buck 
Agin a losin' run of luck, 

Not even if I'm busted ; 
But raly, if I was a saint 
(Which you may rightly judge I ain't 

With being scripter rusted), 
I couldn't help from speakin' out, 
An' may be cussin, too, about 

The way that I am wusted. 

II. 

I don't complain of little pay, 
Which nat'rally declines away 

In ways sometimes expected ; 

138 



SHIFTING SHADOWS, 

But when the children on the claims 
Is named the most jaw-breakin' names 

It's time that I objected. 
For now we've got, ter all intents, 
More kernels, kings, and presidents 

Than ever was elected. 



III. 

Thar's Greasy Jake on Chiny Flat 
Has named his last forthcomin' brat 

Mahony Adams Linkum, 
An' Josh has named his youngest gal 
Miss Roseoler Balmoral 

Elizerbelly Pinkum, 
When neither one ain't worth the lead, 
Much less the rope, when all is said, 

That it wud take ter sink 'm. 



IV. 

Thar's Shote, a squaw-man, with a gang 
Of young uns growin' up ter hang 
Onless they greatly alter ; 

139 



SHIFTING SHADOWS. 

Tor Alfred Byron Marmaduke, 
An' Simon Revelations Luke, 

Is sp'ilin' for the halter ; 
An ; so is Stonewall Moses Lee, 
An' Judus Guiteau Saducee 

Pythagoras Gibralter. 



V. 

Virginny Cleopatrer Rose 
An' Luna Grade Adipose 

Is gals upon the marry ; 
But all the boys has said ter Shote 
They jedged the'r fortunes couldn't float 

With so much style ter carry ; 
Still Shote he called the final one 
Posthumous Spiral Rubicon 

Integumental Harry. 



VI. 

Olfactory Snipe has eight or ten, 
For instance : Ebenezer Ben 

Sir Walter Homer Tanner, 



SHIFTING SHADOV/S. 

Helena Shakspere Simplified, 
Pelucid Astor Ingleside 

Indigenous Bandanner, 
Eructible Rebecker Ruth, 
An* likewise Boberlink Forsooth 

Imprimis Susquehanner. 



VII. 

Thar's David Oleander Grant 
(Whose eyes is most tremenjous slant 

An* legs is bowed amazin' — 
An' I must say my mind ain't fixed 
On which is most infernal mixed, 

His walkin' or his gazin') ; 
An' thar's his sister Ivanhoe 
Saint Agnis, which I bet ter know 

More deviltry than raisin'. 

VIII. 

Thar's Revrund Barnum Beechers Toe, 
A twin ter Ikabod Defoe 

Sartoris Salamander; 



SHIFTING SHADOWS. 

An' Medieval Tildun Blaine 
(Another twin — ter Ponchertraine 

Polaris Alexander) ; 
An' last, not least, is Eglantine 
Ginevrer Donna Ginuine 

Miss Burdett Couts Mirander. 



IX. 

I've had the measles, rheumatiz, 
An' all the wust of ills thar is, 

But they was quite a frolic- 
Was recreations of delight, 
An' pleasanter a dogon sight 

Than names so dierbolic ; 
For Grundy Colfax Omnibus 
Sut Lovingood upsets me wuss 

Than cramps assistin' colic. 



X. 

My arms and legs was frequent broke, 
Which no one heard a cuss word spoke 

Though constant recommended ; 



SHIFTING SHADOWS. 

But thar's a p'int whar human grit 
Gits weakened, like a bow when it 

Is kept eternal bended ; 
An' so as kickin' ain't no use, 
It's rulable to cut aloose 

As latterly intended. 

XL 

I principally hate ter growl, 
But durn my picter for an owl 

If this ain't overdoin' ! 
I'd ruther, as a constant thing, 
Set down upon a hornit's sting, 

Or fight a hungry bruin, 
Than everlastin'ly ter hear 
Them titles ringin' in my ear, 

Amountin' ter blue ruin. 



XII. 

I come out here in 'forty-nine, 
But now I'm ready to resign 

An' shake all ol' connections. 



SHIFTING SHADOWS. 

I want to find some blessid spot 
Whar children ain ; t — at least is not 

Beholden to elections 
An' sich for names that, ciphered out, 
Wud kiver nigh onter about 

A mile in all directions. 



SONG OF THE KLAMATH. 
I. 

A MERRY and mad and terrible stream, 
That dashes and gleams and gloats 
O'er dead men's bones and golden stones, 

And the wreck of a thousand boats, 
O'er the strangled tones and muffled moans 
Of a throng of silent throats. 



II. 

Ay, terrible, merry, and mad they say. 

Though I revel and roll in smiles; 
But the human race with its pallid face 
Will hurry away from my dread embrace 

As I dance through the mountain aisles. 

(10) 145 



SHIFTING SHADOWS. 



III. 

And well may they fear this timorous tribe, 

For I fancy a singular toll, 
And oft as I can from my enemy, man, 

I snatch a reluctant soul. 



IV. 

Then madly I toy with the pitiful clay 

Which struggled and gasped and died, 

And into his arms all my treasure of charms 
I cast like a newly made bride. 



V. 

I kiss the warm glory of hair from his brow, 

And cradle him on my breast ; 
But his lips are as mute as a stringless lute, 
And I know that it is but Dead Sea fruit 
My circling arms have pressed. 



SHIFTING SHADOWS. 



VI. 

Then over the rapids and rocks away 

I rush with my rigid prize, 
And anchor him deep in an icy sleep, 
While friends make search and kindred weep, 

And a maiden sobs and sighs. 



VII. 

And finally swollen, bruised, and black, 

I lift him up on a wave, 
And heave him aside — this mother's pride- 
With nothing left in the world beside 

A coffin and a grave. 



VIII. 

Ay, terrible, merry, and mad am I 
When some rude wall intrudes 
His bulwark gray, as though to say 
He questioned my queenly right of way 
Through the mountain solitudes. 



147 



SHIFTING SHADOWS. 

IX. 

I flaunt my crest in the face of the sky, 

And charge with a mighty shriek, 
And the looming rock gives way to the shock, 
While echoes fly like birds in a flock 
From many a polar peak. 

X. 

Then over the grinding mass I leap 

With my flossy hair outflung, 
And the wind sweeps down to brighten a crown 
From the wall of granite, broken and brown, 

By these fierce fingers wrung. 

XI. 

Then on and on, with a rush and roar 

And a shout of victory ! 
With a mocking wail to the howling gale, 
And a hiss to the mortals stricken pale, 

And mute with awe of me ; 
Forever on to the tender hail 

Of my love in the solemn sea. 
i 4 s 



SHIFTING SHADOWS. 



XII. 

A merry and mad and terrible stream 
Through a Christian land to flow, 
With dimples that ride on its scintillant tide, 
To lure the unwary, as well as to hide 
Its treacherous undertow. 



XIII. 

Be it so ; but still, as the years glide by, 
I shall gather my ghostly toll ; 

For I hate the face of the human race, 
And the slavery of the soul. 



"TRANQUILLA." 

A GROVE of oaks whose green arms interwoven 
Athwart the grassy lawn their umbrage throw ; 
Imperial plumes and clumps of verdure, cloven 

By silver missiles from the moon's bright bow, 
While symphonies, as of some rapt Beethoven, 

From out the bascage tremble, sweet and low, 
And like a palace in a veil of foam, 
Amidst the twilight rises childhood's home. 

I wander back through avenues of madness, 

Through dews of disappointment and regret; 

Through dusky aisles where broods a sweet-eyed sadness 
Among the dreams she cannot all forget; 

And out into the phantom realm of gladness 
And afterglow of suns forever set, 

Where memory-buds in silent beauty blow 

Among the evergreens of long ago. 



SHIFTING SHADOWS. 

How mightily the Chattahoochee rushes 

With wondrous contributions to the sea ! 

How tenderly night's dim and distant hushes 
The mocking-bird invades with melody ! 

While virgin roses strew the earth with blushes 

And jasmines cast their curls from every tree ! 

For in a spell I fondly muse and float 

Within the years, the cherished, the remote. 



Above me Kennesaw is grandly looming, 
A stately pillar in a billowed plain, 

The purple of his princely shadow glooming 
The golden armor of the serried grain, 

While on his brow the rose of sunset blooming 
Along the landscape sifts a ruby rain, 

And one ray-blossom, like a blessing, falls 

Upon Tranquilla's oak-embowered walls. 



I stand within my chamber, at whose casement 
A deep-hued poplar all his glory swings, 

While here and there, up-creeping from the basement, 
An ivy leaf its tender message brings — 



SHIFTING SHADOWS. 

A leaf, like love, that overlooks displacement, 

And still for coldness but the closer clings- 
And then I sigh that thus its heart hath grown 
Like mine about an unresponsive stone. 



I stand and muse on each familiar token 

That hangs before me eloquent and mute, 

Renewing links in life that time hath broken, 
Out-calling olden chords from passion's lute, 

And resurrecting vows more looked than spoken, 
Fair promise-buds that bore no happy fruit ;- 

I stand and muse, then sadly, one and all, 

I turn their patient faces to the wall. 



And then a silver bell's soft note comes stealing 
Along the darkness wooing unto prayer, 

And in the dear and sacred circle kneeling 
I lose the sinking consciousness of care, 

And only know that love, and faith, and feeling, 
And constancy are all united there ; 

While in the world but specters we pursue, 

And reaching out for roses, gather rue. 
152 



SHADOWS OF DAWN 



TO DELL. 
I. 

WANDERING in the gloaming, precious, 
Under all the stars that mesh us 
In their toils of light, 
Wish I fondly thou wert folden 
To my heart as in the olden, 

Golden days, to-night. 

II. 

Listening to the streams that darkle 
Down the mountain-ribs, and sparkle 

With the gems they bear, 
Dream I that in every floated 
Murmur from the silver-throated 

Ripples, thou art near. 



SHA D IV S OF DA WN. 

III. 

Yet 'tis all a sweet illusion, 
But a sunbeam's swift intrusion 

On a grated cell ; 
Merely incense floated over 
Cliff and canyon from the clover 
In a distant dell. 

IV. 

So, beside the singing stream, I 
Linger, dreaming still the dream I 

Dreamt in days gone by ; — 
Idly dream till morning edges 
With a rosy rim the ledges 

Of the dappled sky. 

V. 

Ah, the sweet ! and ah, the bitter ! 
Ah ! the mingled gloom and glitter 

In the woof of years ! 
Mountain streams moan disappointment, 
And a- weary hope no ointment 

Yields my heart but tears. 
156 



TO A FALSE CHARMER. 

LOVED I thee ? Ah ! ' twas a fleeting 
^ Fancy that beset my mind ; 

For I rind myself repeating, 
Since my heart is calmly beating, 

"Coldness was but being kind." 

Still, the gentle thoughts I bore thee 

Are abandoned with regret ; 

And in dreams I still adore thee, 

Still as foolishly implore thee, 

Ne'er my passion to forget. 

Castles had I built — but broken 

Is the charm which made them fair, 
And there bides no sign nor token 
Of our love-tale, looked or spoken, 

With its vows of empty air. 



SHADOWS OF DAWN. 

Deem not that I would upbraid thee, 
For thou wert to me as just 

As the mold of nature made thee ; 

As the fickle thought that swayed thee 
As a woman to her trust ! 



FANCIES IN THE FIRE. 

I SIT and look into the coals ; they seem 
To languish lazily the while I dream 
And ponder as the colored gases rise 
Inflamed before me ; but my poring eyes 
Can scarce be said to truly recognize 

The rosy conflagration, for each warm, 
Ephemeral expression as it flies 

Athwart the furnace is a face, a form, 
A picture, and each fleeting jet of flame 

Some sweetest thought suggests. In idleness 
I thus commune with memory till each same 

Familiar incident agone doth press 

Its tender presence. Ah ! I would confess 
That in this hushed inclosure of the mind 
A thousand fragrant thoughts and things I find 
Among the shadows. 



SHADOWS OF DAWN. 

As into the waves 
The diver headlong plunges, and from graves 
With jewels from the mermaids' golden hair 
Encrusted plucks his booty scattered there, 
So I into the past, by silence led, 
Still dreaming, wander, and I gather red 

And incense-laden memories that grow 
Above the tombs within the gloaming. Green 

The grasses are along the path I know 
So well, and sunny-bosomed doves between 
The intervals of silence coo, as through 
The riven cloud-rack falls a gleam of blue 
In April. But forever vanished now 

The days that have been, save within the pale 
Which Love hath thrown around her treasures. Thou 
Hast known the exercise of soul 3 and how 

Love's arms entwine the thoughts that do but sail 
Along the rim of recollection. So 
My heart ; but dearer far than all I know 
A thought, a fairy thought, as clean as snow, 
And warm as summer twilight when the dew 
Hath scarce begun to gather ; and to you 
This gentle thought its sweet existence owes ; 
I see a bright fair face which ever grows 

160 



SHADOWS OF DAWN. 

By gazing on't more fair. I see bright eyes 
Look into mine, as from the open skies 
The stars shine on the sea, diffusing light 
Along the waste of waters and the night; 
I see — since 'tis a picture — little feet 

Half hidden, half disclosed, that barely reach 
The carpet ; and bright cheeks as fresh and sweet 

As tinted morning-glories, while on each 
Of two rich lips a crimson glory dwells. 
I feel a timid hand in mine ; — that tells 
The story ! O, the brown hair on the brow ! 
The yearning, soulful gaze ! To heaven I vow 
My little one — and thee, that at thy shrine 

Henceforth I worship. Years and years have flown 

Since first we met, but now with thought alone 
My mute companion, every look of thine 
Comes drifting to me from the silent sea, 
And in my heart I feel, I know, that we 

Have to each other more than dearly grown ; 
And in the picture-coals rise ghosts of thee, 
Whose sad eyes look a soft "Come back to me," 
Would that I might ! If strength of love could bear 
The burden of a feather in the air, 



(") 



SHADOWS OF DAWN. 

My soul's devotion would so far exceed 
The love of men that, like a bird, I'd speed 
Rejoicing to thy feet. 

The hours glide by, 
The bells throb out eleven, and as die 
The trembling intonations, and the wind 
Sighs through the trees, I still can find 

A sympathetic sadness in the tone — 
A plaintiveness to which my weary mind 

Can turn, and feel, though lonely, less alone. 



MY SWEETHEART. 

I HAVE a sweetheart fair to see, 
With hair as brightly brown 
As ever curled in Paradise 
About an angel's crown. 



Her lips are dewy with delights, 
And kissed with crimson hue ; 

And in her eyes are starry skies 

With love-stars glowing through. 



And she hath lily hands, I ween, 
With soft and peachy palms, 

And, like her lips, her finger tips 
Are charged with magic balms. 

163 



SHADOWS OF DAWN. 

And merry dancing feet hath she 
That dimple all the lawn, 

When sunrise hurls his golden curls 
Unto the blushing dawn. 

The pink and pearly-throated shell, 
Which loves the summer sea, 

No music sighs but that she hies 
To murmur it to me. 

And in this wide old wondrous world 
Our hearts shall still entwine, 

Until the ivy's flag is furled 
Above her dust and mine. 



164 



HER NAME. 

I HAVE a friend. Her name ? Hard by the rill 
Between the green flags coursing, birds are singing 
And caroling her name. The stream which still 

Upon its happy little breast is bringing 
Sweet freights of broken blossoms from the hill 

Whereon the wild-flowers congregate, can tell 
As well as I. The night wind in the roses 

Whose fairy wings beat fragrance from the bell 
Of nodding blossom which at even closes 

And folds its curtains, whispers, as it flies, 
The secret of her name. 

Hast thou not heard 
A moaning in the pines, whose harps are stirred 
By spirit fingers ? Hast thou, when the skies 
Are gloamy, and the soulful twilight dies 

165 



SHADOWS OF DAWN. 

Away into a starry silence, caught 

Some soft, delicious symphony of song 
Unborn of earth, which sweeps and swells along 
The purple atmosphere ? — a music fraught 
With hints of summer seas, and droning shells, 
And sweetest violets in dewy dells ? 
These breathe her winsome name; — the very rain 
Which patters on the furrowed window-pane 
Repeats the soft refrain — and yet again, 
As though by fond reiterance to press 
A dim suspicion of the loveliness 
The words imply. Ask of the burnished dove, 
In sunny dingles murmuring her love, 
The tender story which I may not tell, 
The name which violets and roses spell 
In perfume — which the angels in my dreams 
Unto each other whisper — which the streams, 
O'erhung with tangled blossoms coyly trace 
With mocking waves that write but to erase. 
Ask of the twilight's purple, morning's gold, 
But ask not me this fond name to unfold. 



166 



NEMESIS. 

I CANNOT sleep to-night ; a shadow dwells 
Upon the threshold of my chamber door ; 
A ghostly Presence stalks across the floor 
In silence, and I feel it sweeping o'er 
My life; while audibly the midnight swells 
From bells that hang in churchyards, and from bells 
In belfries everywhere. 

I cannot sleep ; 
I hear the rags of gaunt Ill-fortune sweep 
Along the isolation of my room, 
And feel the specter in the heavy gloom 
Infolding me. The stars in one huge shroud 
Are buried ; and the tears from every cloud 
Are dripping on my heart. Along the street 
The lamplights shed a glamour, but the feet 

167 



SHADOWS OF DAWN. 

That hurry through the storm no comfort bring 
Unto my solitude. The leathern wing 
Of this dark bat which flaps along the wall 
Is more my true companion now than all 

The multitude of men. My friends — alas ! 
I have none now — had never ! and I pray 
That in this life again I never may, 
To kiss the cheek, like Judas, and betray. 

There was a time when hope — that too may pass ; 
The butterfly hath turned a creeping thing, 
And where was erst a rainbow of a wing 
Is now but rottenness. 

I cannot sleep ! 
A dreadful Absence haunts me, and I keep 
Communion with a Curse whose fingers hook 

Upon the veil about the future ; wide 
It draws the curtaining, and from the Book 

Wherein is written all that shall betide, 
Such dreary passages recites that I, 

To horror still unused, am in despair, 

While prophecies involve the choking air, 
And like to evil things on dark wings fly, 



168 



SHADOWS OF DAWN. 

And circle over me. I feel the brush 
Of spectral pinions beating in the hush 
About me, and I shudder, though the air 
Is close, and ever and anon the glare 
Of lightnings brand the night. 

O, cruel Fate ! 

Why to these lips dost thou unkindly press 
Thy bitter chalice ? Why this desolate, 

Aweary heart, whose utter loneliness 
No love assuages, dost thou still delight 
In torturing ? Why dost thou, in the night, 
With strange creations hem me, and outpour 

Upon my racking brain this grim despair ? 
Alas ! thy bleak wings through my slumbers soar 

Until I even dream that love, so fair, 
Is false. There was a maiden from whose eye 

No guile looked out. Her lips were as the rose, 
The red, ripe rose, when twilight zephyrs sigh 

In spring-time, and the golden gateways close 
Behind the coursers of the sun ; and she 
So sweet and bud-like in her purity, 
So like a cooing dove, in one mad hour 
Enslaved me — and the fragrance of the flower 

169 



SHADOWS OF DAWN. 

Still haunts me. Ah ! the fevered dream is flown, 

And I abide in wretchedness alone ; 

The sport of sad repinings and regrets, 

The while my heart all other thought forgets, 

And struggling in the chafings of its chains, 

But wounds itself, and multiplies its pains. 



170 



SONG OF LIFE. 



THROB ! Throb ! Throb ! 
'Tis the restless heart's refrain; 
The burden sad of the ocean's song, 
Sweeping its fretted sands along ; 

Tearing the corals and pearls from its caves, 
Lifting them up on its petulant waves, 
And dashing them back again. 

II. 

Thrill ! Thrill ! Thrill ! 
And the chalice of bliss runs o'er; 
The nestling head on the heaving breast 
Drooping and sinking unto its rest, 

The while impassioned arms entwine, 
Awakening ecstasies divine, 

That ne'er were felt before. 



SHADOWS OF DAWN. 

III. 

Throb! Throb! Throb! 
And the watches vigil keep; 
The night wind sighs through the cedar's surge, 
And Death comes in with the ghostly dirge, 
Closing the eyelids over their glass, 
And the watchers are mourners, alas and alas 
And the women bow down and weep. 

IV. 
Thrill ! Thrill ! Thrill ! 
And the music palpitates, 
While happy feet in circles glide, 
Like flowers afloat on a dimpled tide, 
Careless of where their feet be cast, 
so they haply come at last, 
Through Pleasure's palace gates. 

V. 

Throb ! Thrill ! Throb ! 
O, how the discord swells ! 
And hope and fear, and smile and tear, 
Woven together year by year, 

Daylight and darkness, gloom and glow, 
Mingled in one weird theme, as though 
Of bridal-burial bells. 
172 



STILL WILL I HAPPY BE. 
I. 

WHEN in my fairest dreams 
Visions I see; 
Each a reflection seems, 
Loved one, of thee ; 
For in thine azure eyes, 
Love like a jewel lies, 
Shining for me. 

II. 

And in my bosom, deep 

Cloistered aside, 
Pure as a pearl asleep 

Under the tide, 
Only thine image reigns ; 
No other thought remains 

Love to divide. 



SHADOWS OF DAWN. 

III. 

And there thy vows so true 

Sweetly repose, 
Like starry gems of dew, 

Clasped by -a rose ; 
And how my fond heart reels 
With all the bliss it feels, 

Nobody knows. 

IV. 

And when the roses bloom 

Over my head, 
Roofing my lowly tomb, 

Fragrant and red, 
Still will I happy be, 
For thou shalt come to me, 

Come still, though dead. 



174 



THE FATAL PLEDGE. 

ALONG the beetling crags and cliffs that bowed 
X~~V Their shaggy outline to the chipping tide, 
And threw their ghostly shadows, dense and dim, 
Across the distance, sighed the summer wind, 
And down the aisles of air obliquely swept 
The fleecy gold of sunset; far below, 
The river, like a spectral mirror, threw 
A weird effulgence on the balmy air 
Which grew nigrescent momently — the while, 
Upon the topmost bowlder, where the last 
Rich reach of glory smote the stately trees 
And drowsy blossoms, Hattie sat with Hugh. 
The twilight gathered, and the purpling scene 
Waxed into wild proportions through the haze, 
And mountains rose like giant obelisks 
Along the near horizon, for the eye 
Could trace but wraiths and vagaries. The stars 

175 



SHADOWS OF DAWN. 

At silent intervals stole into place, 
Until in troops and cluster-clouds they wheeled 
Along the arc of God; and then the flowers 
Outwafted dreamy incense to the winds, 
And moonlight hung her royal banner out 
Above the scene, while far and faint below, 
The river sang a lullaby, and rocked 
Itself to sleep. 

So Hugh clasped Hattie's hand 
And cried : " How long, my darling, wilt thou thus 
The crowning of my love delay? Thy tongue 
The temper of thine eye doth oft gainsay, 
Refuting to my heart the neutral speech 
Wherewith thou crucifiest me. Then here, 
Where earth is hushed to rest, and where the soul 
Throws off the shackles of its destiny, 
Give thou to me the love still unconfessed, 
Yet ne'er refused ! And, Hattie, shouldst thou doubt, 
Then gauge my fierce affection to thy choice ! 
Bid me from this bare battlement to plunge 
Into the stream which kisses as it cuffs 
The naked rocks that hem it ! — and if I 
Shouldst falter in thine order's execution, 

176 



SHADOWS OF DAWN. 

Then doom me, Hattie, with a cold reply, 
And send me, groping, in the world to die." 
The moon hung pale athwart the eastern verge 
As though to dip behind the purple screen 
Whence she but now had risen. Not a sound, 
No stir, save ever and anon the splash 
Of multitudes of restless waters. 

Then 
The maiden said : '" My hand is fettered, Hugh; 
My heart was always thine — beats still for thee I" 



We may not follow tender word and deed — 

Sweet kisses rained on trembling ruby lips, 

And fond avowals bursting from the heart 

Like blossoms in the tropics ! They agreed 

According to their worship, and the stars 

Looked down and smiled. Then he; "Take thou 

this ring 
In token of my faith. In giving it, 
I pledge my sacred troth to love but thee." 
She took the stone-crowned circlet from his hand,. 
And drawing from her finger fair a gem, 
(12) 177 



SHADOWS OF DAWN. 

Gave it to him, and said: "And this to thee 
In earnest of my love ; and it shall rest 
With thee, a pledge that I am only thine." 
She held it forth to him, and as he reached 
To clasp the precious gift, it fell, and flashed 
Adown the arching height. There, on a twig, 
The rayful stone in oscillation hung, 
Refracting Luna's crescent argency 
Into a fan of beams — a seeming sphere 
Of flame invisibly suspended ; or 
A fallen star, which wandering down through space 
Had poised itself mysteriously bright 
Within the dripping concave of the rocks. 
"Wait till I get it, Hattie ! " Hugh exclaimed, 
As down the grim escarpment of the hill 
He frantically sprung. Beneath his feet 
The moonlit rocks were traitors, bounding down 
Into the dim abyss, when trod upon, 
With laughter as of scorn. Still Hugh strove on, 
From danger into peril, till his hand 
Was reaching out to seize the truant pledge. 
Then Hattie, from the parapet looked down 
And saw her lover stretching forth to clasp 
The ring. She saw him free it from the spray, 
178 



SHADOWS OF DAWN. 

And heard him shout: "Now, Hattie, thou art mine!' 

Then as her eager eyes were on him bent, 

She saw him totter in the ghostly light 

And grasp the twig on which the gem had shone. 

She gazed with icy horror on his face, 

Turned upward in a marble pallor. Then 

With one proud hand he held the diamond up, 

The fatal diamond, crying, "Thou art mine ! " 

And so the frail twig parted, and adown 

The sullen eminence the lover wheeled. 

"Forever thine !" upon the cliff was heard, 

And whitely through the night a dress of snow 

Was fluttering ! — a double splash — a hush — 

A thousand circles widening on the stream — 

A deeper silence ! — and the stars looked down 

And kissed the dew-tears weeping Night had shed. 



BELLE. 

HER eyes are blue, her voice is song, 
Her hair is silken, brown and long- 
O, she is passing fair ! 
And when she smiles, a sunny glow 
Across each feature flies, 
Like some rare beam that hies 
In winter to a drift of snow, 

And flushing one bright moment, dies 
In splendor there. 

Beneath the roses red and rare 
She gave her life into my care, 

Gave all her heart to me; 
And when beneath the mistletoe 
She standeth at my side, 
My Beautiful, my Bride, 
My soul its fullest bliss shall know, 
Unheedful of the stormy tide 

On Time's mad sea. 

180 



HEAVEN'S ROSES. 



DEAD of night : the world is sleeping ; 
Dead of winter: winds are weeping, 
And a wasted form is keeping 

Vigil near her empty bed. 
Here and there a coal is lying 
In the gloomy grate, but dying, 

Slowly dying — all are dead. 

II. 

Poverina sighs ! The chilly 
Blast will blight the tender lily — 
Ay, she sighs ; her brother Willie 

May be frozen in the snow ! 
And she listens to the whisper 
Of the weird wind, waxing crisper, 

In its monologue of woe. 



SHADOWS OF DAWN. 

III. 
Willie all alone is lying 
In a winding snow-shroud, dying, 
And the frosty gusts are sighing 

In the bare boughs overhead ; 
Willie's heart is hushed ! the whirling 
Ice-wreaths round his brow are curling — 

Furling, folding o'er the dead. 

IV. 

Through the broken window wheeling 
Snow-flakes silently are stealing, 
And the orphan girl is kneeling 

Like a marble statue fair ; 
And a big tear, frozen, flashes 
On her closed eyes' silken lashes 

In the dip-light's fitful glare. 

V. 

How the storm host fiercely marches 
Through the city's icy arches ! 
How it twirls the limes and larches 

At the rich man's, on the hill !. 

182 



SHADOWS OF DAWN. 

How its ghostly toils are stealing 
O'er the gentle maiden kneeling 

At the cot-side, chill and still ! 

VI. 

Cold the maiden grows, and colder, 
As the bitter blasts enfold her, 

In the darksome dead of night ; 
And a white hand stiffly closes 
O'er the bosom which reposes — 
Heaven is harvesting its roses — 

And her pure young soul takes flight. 



183 



FAREWELL. 

I. 

IS the heart I fondly fancied, 
Ah ! too fondly fancied, mine, 
Thus to twine its truant tendrils 

'Round another, newer shrine? 
Go ! The trellis from the roses 

Tear, and trail them in the dust ; 
Let their perfume not detain thee : 
Get thee gone — if go thou must ! 

II. 

Dream'st thou that a heart is broken 
Like some handicraft of clay ? 

Think'st thou 'tis a wanton blossom 
To be plucked and thrown away ? 



SHADOWS OF DAWN. 

Lady, go thy ways ; the rustle 

Of thy garments wake a thrill 

Which no coldness may extinguish, 
And a hope no fate can still. 

III. 

Let us strangers be forever, 

And the sea our paths divide ; 
Let the cold world stretch between us — 

If we be not side by side ; 
Let the music of thy footfall 

Never scar this heart again ; 
For the bliss of being near thee 

Is but servant to the pain. 

IV. 

Let us be unto each other 

As the palm unto the pole, 
For I cast thee, as an idol, 

From the temple of my soul ; 
And howe'er in. fond illusion 

To thy shrine my heart hath clung, 
'Twas upon a cross uplifted, 

Twas a thorn on which it hung. 
185 



SHADOWS OF DAWN. 



Then farewell ! I loved thee, lady ; 

Go ! The roses still shall bloom 
Though their tearful, tangled clusters 

Trail above Affection's tomb. 
Not thy hand ! 'Twere such temptation 

In its heavenly clasp to die, 
That my soul had not the courage 

Nor the care to say good-by. 

VI. 

'Twas not mine, alas ! to charm thee; 

Then how less 'tis mine to chide I 
Still in wild regret I covet 

All the bliss thou hast denied ; 
Ah ! thou canst not know the longings 

Which reflection still must wake, 
Nor the smothered, choking anguish 

Of a heart too proud to break. 



1 86 



WHOSE IS SHE? 

THEY stand in the City of Silence, hushed 
As the white stones strewed around, 
And the low wind moans through the finger bones> 
Of the skeleton trees in its weirdest tones, 
And rustles the snow on the ground. 

They crouch in the dim necropolis 

With a sinking and solemn dread, 
And quake with fear that man may appear 
When never a human is anywhere near, 
And only the evergreen's plaint they hear 
Monotonous overhead. 

Save those mute two no mortal foot 

On the ominous tryst intrudes, 
And yet they descry with a fatuous eye 
Full many a foe in the glooms that lie 

In the haunted solitudes. 
187 



SHADOWS OF DAWN. 

Then silently, swiftly off and away 

Through the dim white wastes of night, 
While wide flakes fall on a face and a pall, 
And a form whose witchery shows through all 
Its cerements full and white. 

They bear their pallid prize away, 

But out of the cedars 7 gloom 
A sweet refrain steals again and again, 
As though by reiterance still to restrain 

The ravishment of the tomb. 

if. >K ^ ^c * 

I 

A fond mother kneels at a snow-heaped mound 

And boweth her head in prayer, 
While standing above her the dead maiden's lover, 
In tears, as with roses he seeketh to cover 

The ashes he dreameth are there. 

And as the hot drops of their grief repeat 

Swift graves in the drifted snow, 
They eagerly pray that the soul of the clay, 
Adorning some star in the distance away, 
To them may look down in compassion to-day 

And witness their love and their woe. 



SHADOWS OF DAWN. 

tc O maiden Inona!" the lad exclaims, 

While madly his hands entwine, 
"Come back to this breast and its weary unrest — 
The sun of my life hath gone down in the west — 

Come back unto me, thou art mine ! " 

Then out of an old tomb standing by, 

O'er ivied and gray, and grim, 
The wind breathes low, like the fall of the snow, 
"She is mine!" and the lover turns quickly to know 
If man it may be making sport of his woe, 
But naught can he see save an old sad tree, 

And the tomb, and the lady by him. 

Then out from the burial-yard they go, 

But still in the wailing pine, 
And in the soft dash of the snow on the sash 
They listen again to the ghostly refrain, 

" She is mine ! " 



189 



A SIGH ON THE AIR. 



THERE is a sigh upon the air, 
A fading in the leaf, 
And in this weary heart, a grave 
Bedewed with tears of grief. 
There is a loneliness unknown 

To men I daily greet, 
Which threads the desert of my soul 
With weary, friendless feet. 

II. 

There is a dream forever flown, 
A star in darkness set ; 

There is a bitterness untold 
In all I would forget. 

190 



SHADOWS OF DAWN. 

And from each broken bud that bends 

In Memory's acre fair, 
There comes unto this weary heart 

A sigh upon the air. 

III. 

But faded buds shall bloom again 

When spring's soft breezes blow, 
And on the grave with tears bedewed 

The violet shall grow ! 
What though an idle dream be flown, 

Or one fair star be set ! 
It may be some dim providence 

To make me happy yet. 



i 9 i 



FAITHLESS. 

HOW oft my soul hath hung enchained 
Upon thy wooing tongue, 
To be by brooding silence pained 

Or bitter coldness wrung ! 
Ah me, that in so sweet a lute 

A string should silent be ! — 

The golden chord, forever mute, 

That trembled once for me ! 

If on thy lips a queenly bloom 

From some bright Eden fell, 
They caught a treacherous perfume 

From some dark source as well. 
Ah me, that lips so richly fraught 

With passion's mantling morn 
Could dimple to a happy thought 

While curled in cruel scorn 1 
192 



SHADOWS OF DAWN. 

If rapture rode upon thy glance 

And love thy look oppressed, 
The smile but winged an angry lance 

To pierce my faithful breast. 
Ah me, that eyes so fondly blue 

Could melt with tender trust, 
Or with their icy lightnings strew 

Life's temples in the dust ! 

If on my lips the sparkling cup 

Of love hath shed its dew, 
The hand which held the goblet up 

O'erturned the chalice too ; 
If from my life thy voice has brushed 

Some haunting cares away, 
The same sweet, ruthless charm hath crushed 

Its idols into clay. 



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